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Human Rights Watch on Sunday called for the dismissal of charges brought by authorities in Kazakhstan against outspoken feminist and LGBTQ+ rights activist Zhanar Sekerbayeva.
Commenting on the difficult circumstances faced by Sekerbayeva, Mihra Rittmann, Central Asia adviser at Human Rights Watch, stated: “The Kazakh authorities should drop the charges against Sekerbayeva and put an end to the manufactured case against her…No one in Kazakhstan should fear criminal retaliation for being lesbian or for peacefully advocating for the rights of LGBT people.”
The criminal charges of battery against her were first filed on the 26th of March, with the first hearing scheduled for the 7th of April. These charges were related to an earlier incident at a cafe in the capital city of Astana, where she and a fellow activist were initially detained. A group of people had shown up at the cafe spewing anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, filming others without consent, and acting in an aggressive manner. Sekerbayeva alleged that the group of individuals was not held accountable for their actions. Instead, she claims that the authorities had conducted a one-sided investigation based entirely on a complaint from Ziuar Zhumanova, whom she accused of inciting tensions at the cafe.
Despite later filing a complaint with the authorities, requesting them to pursue sanctions against Zhumanova for causing the disruption at the cafe and allegedly blocking and pushing her, leading to injuries, nothing has arisen from this complaint. As the co-founder of the Kazakhstan Feminist Initiative ‘Feminita’, she has gained prominence in the country, not merely as an activist, but as a necessary force confronting systemic silence in the justice system.
Her pioneering advocacy focuses on two deeply entangled issues, namely domestic violence and sexual abuse crimes, both of which often remain underreported, due to existing biases in the judicial system that render victims invisible. This incident is merely the latest in a string of public persecutions by the authorities against her, such as in June 2018, after a peaceful photo shoot intended to break the stigmas surrounding menstruation, she was threatened with physical force and detained under vague charges of ‘minor hooliganism.’
In July 2023, a man deliberately drove his vehicle at Sekerbayeva in a threatening way and likened her to a paedophile, comments that he later defended to the police, justifying it as an adequate response to her sexual orientation.
The post Rights group urges Kazakhstan to dismiss charges and release activist Zhanar Sekerbayeva appeared first on JURIST - News.
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Commenting on the difficult circumstances faced by Sekerbayeva, Mihra Rittmann, Central Asia adviser at Human Rights Watch, stated: “The Kazakh authorities should drop the charges against Sekerbayeva and put an end to the manufactured case against her…No one in Kazakhstan should fear criminal retaliation for being lesbian or for peacefully advocating for the rights of LGBT people.”
The criminal charges of battery against her were first filed on the 26th of March, with the first hearing scheduled for the 7th of April. These charges were related to an earlier incident at a cafe in the capital city of Astana, where she and a fellow activist were initially detained. A group of people had shown up at the cafe spewing anti-LGBTQ+ rhetoric, filming others without consent, and acting in an aggressive manner. Sekerbayeva alleged that the group of individuals was not held accountable for their actions. Instead, she claims that the authorities had conducted a one-sided investigation based entirely on a complaint from Ziuar Zhumanova, whom she accused of inciting tensions at the cafe.
Despite later filing a complaint with the authorities, requesting them to pursue sanctions against Zhumanova for causing the disruption at the cafe and allegedly blocking and pushing her, leading to injuries, nothing has arisen from this complaint. As the co-founder of the Kazakhstan Feminist Initiative ‘Feminita’, she has gained prominence in the country, not merely as an activist, but as a necessary force confronting systemic silence in the justice system.
Her pioneering advocacy focuses on two deeply entangled issues, namely domestic violence and sexual abuse crimes, both of which often remain underreported, due to existing biases in the judicial system that render victims invisible. This incident is merely the latest in a string of public persecutions by the authorities against her, such as in June 2018, after a peaceful photo shoot intended to break the stigmas surrounding menstruation, she was threatened with physical force and detained under vague charges of ‘minor hooliganism.’
In July 2023, a man deliberately drove his vehicle at Sekerbayeva in a threatening way and likened her to a paedophile, comments that he later defended to the police, justifying it as an adequate response to her sexual orientation.
The post Rights group urges Kazakhstan to dismiss charges and release activist Zhanar Sekerbayeva appeared first on JURIST - News.
Continue reading...
Note: We don't have any responsibilities about this news. Its been posted here by Feed Reader and we had no controls and checking on it. And because News posted here will be deleted automatically after 21 days, threads are closed so that no one spend time to post and discuss here. You can always check the source and discuss in their site.