Rights groups: no justice in Kyrgyzstan

BISHKEK, Kyrgyzstan (AP) — Kyrgyz authorities have failed to ensure justice for victims of last year's ethnic violence in the Central Asian nation, and that could cause a new wave of unrest, leading international human rights groups warned Wednesday.

Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International released their reports ahead of the first anniversary of clashes between ethnic Kyrgyz and minority Uzbeks in the southern cities of Osh and Jalal-Abad. At least 470 people, nearly three-quarters of whom were ethnic Uzbeks, were killed and some 400,000 fled their homes.

The groups said that official investigations into violence and the ensuing trials mainly targeted the Uzbek minority, fomenting tensions that might trigger new violence in the future.

Although the exact circumstances surrounding the intercommunal riots that broke out on June 10, 2010, are the subject of heated disagreement in Kyrgyzstan, violence in subsequent days culminated with a series of pogroms against ethnic Uzbek neighborhoods.

Amnesty urged the Kyrgyz government to fully investigate evidence that attacks on Uzbek neighborhoods were part of an orchestrated assault and that military personnel may have taken direct part in the violence.

"The failure to bring to justice those behind the violence could provide fertile soil for the seeds of future turmoil and future human rights violations," Nicola Duckworth, the head of the group's Europe and Central Asia program, said in a statement.

Human Rights Watch focused on the allegations of torture by police in the weeks after the violence and the apparent overwhelming ethnic bias demonstrated by law enforcement and justice authorities, which are represented largely by ethnic Kyrgyz.

The group said it has gathered credible evidence that police "engaged in widespread and serious abuses of detainee rights, such as arbitrary arrest and detention, extortion, denial of due process guarantees, torture, and ill-treatment."

HRW noted that figures appear to indicate that the police have been highly selective in their investigations into the unrest. While most victims of the June violence were ethnic Uzbek, almost 85 percent of detainees were from that community, and of 124 people detained on murder charges, 115 were ethnic Uzbek, the group said.

"The profoundly flawed investigations and trials, mainly affecting the ethnic Uzbek minority, undermine efforts to promote reconciliation and fuel tensions that might one day lead to renewed violence," HRW said.


(2011-6-8/timesunion.com)