Government honours journalists but still holding newspaper editor after six months

Despite celebrating its “Festival of Journalists” on 28 June, Kazakhstan continues to hold Ramazan Esergepov, the owner and editor of the weekly Alma Ata Info, and is now trying him behind closed doors on a charge of publishing classified documents without letting him be defended by the lawyer of his choice. He faces a possible five-year jail sentence. Reporters Without Borders was outraged when Esergepov was arrested by members of the National Security Committee (KNB) while hospitalised in Almaty on 6 January. His arrest was prompted by a report headlined “Who really runs our country, the president or the KNB?” that cited an internal memo from the KNB office in the southern city of Taraz Now the press freedom organisation is outraged by his continuing detention six months later and by the serious irregularities surrounding the trial that began in Taraz on 23 April. “We call on the Kazakh authorities to release Esergepov pending the outcome of the trial.” As well as not being allowed to choose his own lawyer, Esergepov is unable to call his own witnesses, including the head of the NGO Journalists in Danger, Rozlana Taykina, and jurist Sergei Utkin, who has prepared an expert report on the case. Utkin insists that the charges against Esergepov are baseless because Kazakh law stipulates that all classified documents subject to a publishing ban must be listed in a register and this register contained no mention of the documents published by Alma Ata Info. In another serious irregularity, the KNB, which brought the charges against Esergepov, is itself acting as the court’s expert witness in the case. The KNB is also being represented by its own lawyer, a right denied to Esergepov, who is defending himself. He is also being denied the right to receive visits from his family in prison. Aged 53, he suffers from heart problems, high blood pressure and diabetes, and his state of health is worrying. Esergepov’s detention violates the Kazakh constitution, which guarantees everyone the right to choose their own defence lawyer. The court is also violating article 9 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, which lists the rights of those who are prosecuted and which condemns arbitrary detention. Kazakhstan ratified the covenant in 2006. Kazakhstan is scheduled to take over the rotating presidency of the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe next year. It was ranked 125th out of 173 countries in last year’s Reporters Without Borders press freedom index.