Kazakhstan

2013

  

Four convicted in shooting, stabbing of Kazakh journalist

New York, July 11, 2013–A court in western Kazakhstan has sentenced four men to terms ranging from 11 to 15 years for carrying out the brutal attack on Kazakh journalist Lukpan Akhmedyarov in April 2012, according to news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes this conviction, but calls on Kazakh authorities to identify the…

Read More ›

In this YouTube screenshot, supporters of independent media demonstrate at the press conference where owners of Stan.kz announced its shutdown. (YouTube/Respublika Kz)

Under official pressure, Kazakh broadcaster closes

A blocked website; reporting equipment confiscated; a newsroom sealed; and reporters denied information from state agencies: these things together spelled the end of Stan.kz, a local, independent Internet-based broadcaster which for two years had tirelessly reported on developments in Kazakhstan. “We are forced to shut down the Stan.kz newsroom,” Bauyrzhan Musirov, owner of parent Stan…

Read More ›

Attacks on the Press in 2012: Kazakhstan

Nursultan Nazarbayev’s authoritarian government cracked down on critical news coverage with a flurry of early-year legislation and newsroom raids that came just weeks after deadly clashes between police and striking oil workers in the western city of Zhanaozen. In January, in the wake of the December 2011 labor unrest, Nazarbayev’s government enacted legislation barring distribution…

Read More ›

Embattled Respublika journalists targeted in Kazakhstan

New York, February 6, 2013–Authorities in Kazakhstan should cease harassing the staff of embattled independent newspaper Respublika, the Committee to Protect Journalists said today.

Read More ›

Kazakh reporter says he staged his own abduction

A journalist in Astana, the capital, said in a press conference on January 4, 2013, that he had staged his own disappearance in December to attract government attention to ongoing abuses in the country, according to news reports. Local journalists and press freedom organizations condemned the act, which they said caused “great damage” to the…

Read More ›

2013