By Shayne R. Burnham
Impunity Watch Reporter, Asia

UZBEKISTAN – Haiatjon Juraboev, a refugee, was abducted from Kyrgyzstan last year and returned to Uzbekistan where he is now believed to be on trial.  He is charged with religious extremism and illegal border crossing. The trial was scheduled on January 30.

“We’re very concerned about Juraboev’s safety and well-being in Uzbek custody,” said Holly Cartner, Europe and Central Asia director at Human Rights Watch. “Kyrgyzstan’s failure to protect him is a sad reflection on the state of that country’s refugee protection system.”

In 2007, Juraboev was extradited by the Russian government to Uzbekistan.  He was subsequently arrested and released with no charges.  Juraboev then fled to Kyrgyzstan and registered as an asylum seeker by the Kyrgyz State Committee for Migration and Employment.  He was granted refugee status by the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) in September 2008.

While in Kyrgystan, Juraboev was at a mosque in Bishkek, the capital.  A man claiming to be a Kyrgyz National Security Service officer directed him into a car.  He disappeared until January when his mother learned he was in Tashkent prison.

Human Rights Watch wrote a letter to President Kurmanbek Bakiev of Kyrgyzstan in December.  They asked the government to protect and stop deporting refugees and asylum seekers.  It also calls for the investigations in the disappearances.

“The Uzbek government has made clear it will continue to hound dissidents within and outside its international borders without letting its legal obligations get in the way,” said Cartner. “The Kyrgyz government needs to confirm or deny that its National Security Service apprehended and forcibly returned Juraboev. If it was not involved, then Kyrgyzstan should protest to the Uzbek government that foreign agents operating on its soil abducted and returned an Uzbek refugee, and demand his return.”

Human Rights Watch further states that the Kyrgyz and Uzbek government should collaborate in bringing justice to those responsible for these abductions.

Since 2005, Kyrgyzstan has extradited more than a dozen refugees to Uzbekistan.

For more information, please see:

Human Rights Watch – Uzbekistan:  Abducted Refugee on Trial – 5 February 2009

Radio Free Europe/Radio Free Liberty – Uzbek Refugee Returned to Uzbekistan for Trial – 10 February 2009

Reuters – Rights Group Urges Kyrgyzstan Not to Extradite Uzbek – 14 May 2008