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UZBEKISTAN: "Believers are not even allowed to visit each other"
Members of the Full Gospel Church in Jizak, at an informal meal to celebrate the harvest festival last Tuesday (25 October), had their meal broken up the ordinary police, the National Security Service (NSS) secret police and officials from the Public Prosecutor's office, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. "I think the actions of the law enforcement officers in Jizak were a gross infringement of the law," Iskander Najafov, the church's lawyer, told Forum 18. "It turns out that believers are not even allowed to visit each other." Najafov believes that an anti-Christian campaign is underway, with less violence than in the past but using other methods to pressure churches and individual believers. Religious minorities face continuing official pressure, including the Subbotniki – a Christian movement founded in the eighteenth century who follow many Jewish laws and customs, who were forbidden from holding a religious ritual for one of the community's members who had just died.
According to Kuznetsov, he and the Full Gospel bishop Sergei Nechitailo were visiting church members in Jizak. The congregation in the town has not been able to obtain state registration. Some 40 people had gathered together for a meal in the house of a local church member. "I would stress that this was not a formal religious service, just an informal gathering of believers to celebrate the harvest festival," Kuznetsov told Forum 18. He reports that around 10 officials from the NSS secret police, the ordinary police and the Public Prosecutor's office suddenly burst into the house. They cordoned off the premises and ordered those present to write statements. Church members complain that the officials made threats during the raid. "Women and children were crying and shouting," one church member told Forum 18.
Nechitailo, who identified himself to the officials as the Full Gospel bishop, pointed out that believers were allowed to visit each other and therefore demanded that the law enforcement officials stop their unlawful actions, but they did not respond to Nechitailo's demand. The police recorded the names of all those present and allowed them to go to their homes two hours after the raid began.
"I think the actions of the law enforcement officers in Jizak were a gross infringement of the law," Iskander Najafov, a lawyer for the Tashkent Full Gospel church, told Forum 18 on 26 October. "It turns out that believers are not even allowed to visit each other." He also complained that the police briefly detained Nechitailo, "the head of the registered Full Gospel Christian community".
Begzot Kadyrov, chief specialist at the government's Committee for Religious Affairs in Tashkent, said he had not heard about the police raid on the Full Gospel meeting in Jizak. But he insisted that "Harvest festival is an official Pentecostal festival – they themselves wrote of this themselves when they lodged their registration application," he told Forum 18 from Tashkent on 27 October. "So you can't regard the meeting in Jizak as simply a gathering of friends – it was a religious meeting. And as the Pentecostals are not registered in Jizak, the meeting was therefore illegal." He said Nechitailo, as the leader of the Full Gospel Church in the country, "knows Uzbek laws very well. That's why I find it strange he allowed such a violation."
Najafov, the Church's lawyer, believes that an official anti-Christian campaign is underway, with less violence than in the past but using other methods to pressure churches and individual believers. He said his Church has received reports from various parts of the country that the police are visiting church members' apartments and conducting "so-called preventative discussions in which they question people about their faith". He also told Forum 18 that registration of churches has long since come to a halt, and police are trying to halt all meetings of religious believers in private homes. Uzbek law – in defiance of international human rights standards – bans all unregistered religious activity.
Other religious minorities also continue to face official pressure. Najafov told Forum 18 that the authorities are persecuting a community of Subbotniki – a Christian movement dating back to the eighteenth century of non-Jewish Christians who hold services on Saturday, and follow many but not all Jewish laws and customs. (Subbotniki should not be confused with Seventh-day Adventists.) The Subbotniki live in the Kibrai district of Tashkent region, 15 kilometres (10 miles) north-east of the capital, and every week police come to community members and warn them that it is illegal to hold meetings in private apartments. On 9 August the police even forbade the Subbotniki from holding a religious ritual for one of the community's members who had just died.
Kadyrov of the state Religious Affairs Committee said that he had not heard of the Subbotniki's problems. However, he insisted to Forum 18 that if police officers had in fact obstructed religious rituals for the deceased that would be a violation of the law.
Religious communities throughout Uzbekistan are currently facing attempts by the authorities to isolate them from support (see F18News 3 October 2005 http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=665). (END)
For a personal commentary by a Muslim scholar, advocating religious freedom for all faiths as the best antidote to Islamic religious extremism in Uzbekistan, see http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=338
For more background, see Forum 18's Uzbekistan religious freedom survey at http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=546
For an outline of the repression immediately following the Andijan uprising, see F18News 23 May http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=567 and for an outline of what is known about Akramia and the uprising see 16 June http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=586
A printer-friendly map of Uzbekistan is available at http://www.nationalgeographic.com/xpeditions/atlas/index.html?Parent=asia&Rootmap=uzbeki
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24 October 2005
TURKMENISTAN: More pressure against Islamic religious practise
Turkmenistan appears to be increasing pressure against Islam religious practise, Forum 18 News Service has learnt. A human rights activist has told Forum 18 of increased moves against practising male Muslims visiting mosques in northern Turkmenistan, including two arrests. The MSS secret police officers have made imams hang a list of mosque-goers above the doors to their mosques, and now only those whose names are on the list are allowed to visit that mosque. Turkmenistan's deputy mufti, Atash Zamedov, refused to answer Forum 18's questions about lists of names hung over mosque entrances. Also, after the reduction of student numbers and dismissal of foreign Turkish lecturers at the Muslim theological faculty in Ashgabad, Forum 18 has learnt that all local Turkmen teachers and technical staff as well have been dismissed and replaced with new appointees.
20 October 2005
KYRGYZSTAN: Uzbek claims and extremism law cause little change
Uzbekistan has made unproven allegations of a link between Kyrgyzstan and the Andijan uprising. Despite the Uzbek claims and the passage of a new Kyrgyz extremism law, Forum 18 News Service has found little change in Kyrgyz government policy towards Muslims. The head of a state school in Osh, which borders Uzbekistan, and the head of the regional Religious Affairs Committee have both told Forum 18 that the only change has been that schools have been asked to note the names of children from devout Muslim families. The Religious Affairs Committee head told Forum 18 that "it's just a preventative measure to ensure that children don't fall into the hands of extremist groups. We are not preventing schoolchildren from attending mosques or observing other religious rituals." A local human rights organisation, Luchi Solomona, told Forum 18 that "it's possible that the authorities simply haven't shaken things up yet."
19 October 2005
KYRGYZSTAN: Wide-ranging extremism law not seen as threat
Kyrgyzstan has recently adopted an extremism law with a wide-ranging definition of extremism, which leaves open the possibility of it being applied to peaceful religious communities. However, most religious communities Forum 18 News Service spoke to – such as Catholics, Presbyterians and Jehovah's Witnesses - had mainly not read the law, and did not see it as a current threat. The former mufti of Kyrgyzstan commented to Forum 18 that "the very fact that the authorities are linking religion with extremism is worrying for educated Muslims. But most believers don't even know that a new law has been adopted. Theoretically the law could pose a danger to believers, but so far at least I have not seen any changes in state religious policy." Kanybek Malabayev, of the Kyrgyz government's Religious Affairs Committee, told Forum 18 that "we will apply this law only to the Hizb ut-Tahrir party, whose leaflets contain openly anti-Semitic sentiments."