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Imprisoned
January 23
Sergei Vasilyev, IMPRISONED, LEGAL ACTION
Vasilyev, formerly a reporter for the Kazakstani edition of the Russian newspaper Argumenty i Fakty, was arrested and placed in detention. On July 10, he was found guilty of libeling a public official by the Medeus District Court in Almaty, the Kazak capital. He was sentenced to five months in prison, a term less than the time he had already spent in pretrial detention, and released. On Aug. 10, 1994, Vasilyev had published a brief item alleging that the ex-governor of the East Kazakstan region had been detained by Moscow customs authorities for attempting to smuggle gold across the border. The item was based on an account from a source in the KNB (Kazakstan National Security), but the information turned out to be false, reportedly planted by other officials in an attempt to discredit the governor. After Vasilyev was notified that he was under investigation for criminal libel, he returned to Russia in 1995, even though he had signed a statement promising not to leave Kazakstan. On Jan. 23, 1996, when Vasilyev returned to Kazakstan at the request of his editors, he was promptly arrested in his apartment in the city of Ust-Kamenogorsk. He spent about two months in a local prison without charge and was then transferred to Almaty, where he spent more than three months in an isolation cell until his trial. Argumenty i Fakty did not rehire Vasilyev, and he has been unable to find work in journalism since his release from prison.
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