(CPJ/IFEX) – In a 31 August 2004 letter to President Imomali Rakhmonov, CPJ expressed great concern about an escalating campaign of intimidation and harassment against independent and opposition journalists in Tajikistan. According to CPJ, the actions are further eroding press conditions at the very moment when Tajik citizens most need a free press, in the […]
(CPJ/IFEX) – In a 31 August 2004 letter to President Imomali Rakhmonov, CPJ expressed great concern about an escalating campaign of intimidation and harassment against independent and opposition journalists in Tajikistan. According to CPJ, the actions are further eroding press conditions at the very moment when Tajik citizens most need a free press, in the run-up to parliamentary elections in early 2005.
Independent weeklies based in the capital of Dushanbe, such as “Ruzi Nav” (“New Day”) and “Nerui Sukhan” (“Power of the Word”), and independent journalists have been targeted after criticizing the president and his administration. Harassment, threats and assaults have been reported.
CPJ is deeply disturbed that the president has failed to stop his subordinates from harassing journalists or to ensure that police and prosecutors investigate and indict individuals who attack journalists.
The clampdown on “Ruzi Nav” is of particular concern. The newspaper has endured ever-growing pressure from authorities since its launch in August 2003. “Ruzi Nav” has exposed government corruption and criticized the government’s record in combating drug addiction and prostitution. Disgruntled government officials, including heads of ministries, have threatened “Ruzi Nav” staff with libel lawsuits for allegedly insulting their honor and dignity. Police and security officers harass reporters on assignment, interfering in coverage of the news.
Tax authorities closed “Ruzi Nav”‘s printing house, Dzhiyonkhon, on 19 August, preventing “Ruzi Nav” and other publications from printing their upcoming editions. Dzhiyonkhon, a private operation that has printed “Ruzi Nav” since December 2003, was shut down for supposed tax violations, but journalists believe the closure was an effort to silence independent media ahead of the parliamentary elections, the Associated Press reported (see IFEX alert of 24 August 2004).
“Ruzi Nav”‘s editor-in-chief, Rajabi Mirzo, told CPJ that the paper looked for alternative printing houses but none agreed to print the publication.
“We have 27 printers in Tajikistan, but it is only Dzhiyonkhon that we could work with,” Mirzo said. He said the paper has filed all the necessary applications, but printers say tax authorities have ordered them to refuse “Ruzi Nav” their services.
In certain instances, senior government officials have threatened “Ruzi Nav” directly.
On 29 December 2003, the Prosecutor General’s Office issued a letter instructing the weekly not to insult the honor and dignity of the president and the government, and threatened to close the newspaper if it did not follow the directive, the National Association of Independent Media of Tajikistan (NANSMIT) reported. The official warning was issued after “Ruzi Nav” published an interview with an opposition leader and several letters from readers who criticized the president, Mirzo told CPJ.
Assaults and threats have also been reported. On 29 July 2004, an unidentified assailant in a bulletproof vest attacked Mirzo. According to local press reports, the man attacked Mirzo around 10 p.m. (local time) near his home in Dushanbe, hitting him in the head with an iron bar. Mirzo told CPJ he suffered a concussion and a frontal skull fracture. He was treated at a Dushanbe hospital (see alert of 3 August 2004).
On 30 July, the Sino District Interior Ministry Department opened an investigation under Article 111 of the Criminal Code of Tajikistan, for deliberately inflicting heavy bodily harm. On 2 August, First Deputy Interior Minister Abdurakhim Kakhorov said he is taking the investigation under his personal control, local reports said.
No developments have been reported in the investigation so far.
Mirzo was assaulted once before this year. He and three colleagues were attacked on 18 January while on a business trip in the northern Tajik city of Khujand. After meeting with “Ruzi Nav” readers, their car was pulled over by five men who beat them without explanation, Mirzo told CPJ. Mirzo said he and his colleagues, fearing for their families’ safety, decided at the time to not publicize the January incident.
In a separate case, “Ruzi Nav” correspondent Mavlyuda Sultanzoda and her family have been threatened since last November, she told CPJ. Sultanzoda has written articles in “Ruzi Nav” that criticize Dushanbe Mayor Makhmadasaid Ubaydullayev for being inaccessible to Tajik citizens and for not addressing problems such as drug abuse, prostitution among teenagers and the trafficking of women. The most recent threats to Sultanzoda came in early August after she wrote a profile of the president, headlined, “Kto takoy Rakhmonov?” (“Who is Rakhmonov?”). The profile raised questions about the president’s record in office and criticised the lack of transparency in the government’s policies (see alert of 13 August 2004).
Sultanzoda, who also contributes to the independent weekly “Nerui Sukhan”, told CPJ in a telephone interview from Dushanbe that she has been getting anonymous telephone threats for several months. The callers said she could be raped and killed if she does not stop her critical writing. She added that unidentified men have visited her home and harassed her three young children in her absence. When she reported these threats to local police, Sultanzoda told CPJ, officers did not take her complaints seriously. One asked her: “So what do you want me to do, come to your house and sleep under your bed?”
Reports involving other independent publications and journalists are deeply disturbing as well. “Nerui Sukhan”, an independent weekly that has reported critically about the activities of local and state officials, has been consistently harassed.
On 7 June, for example, the Prosecutor General’s Office sent a letter to “Nerui Sukhan” warning the weekly that it was publishing articles harming the honor and dignity of the president, members of parliament and other government officials, NANSMIT reported. That same day, Deputy Prosecutor General Dodarjon Maksudov summoned “Nerui Sukhan” editor-in-chief Mukhtor Bokhizoda and questioned him about articles that criticized government polices, NANSMIT reported.
“Nerui Sukhan” has also received anonymous threats about articles that oppose President Rakhmonov’s administration and its policies.
On 9 January, “Nerui Sukhan” correspondent Muhhidin Idizoda received a threatening telephone call after writing articles about the well known Tajik poets Buri Karimov, Bozor Sobir and Gulruhsor Safieva, who have been critical of the government, NANSMIT reported. The anonymous caller said Idizoda would face dire consequences if he continued to write positively about opposition figures.
Most recently, on 18 August, tax police seized all copies of the forthcoming edition of “Nerui Sukhan” for allegedly failing to declare its true circulation and shut down its private printer Dzhiyonkhon. Three other titles, including “Ruzi Nav”, could not be printed because no other printing house would agree to run them, citing orders from tax authorities. At the time of this writing, the publications have still not found an alternative printer.
In some cases, independent journalists such as Nargis Zokirova, who works for the independent weekly “Biznes I Politika” (“Business and Politics”), have been threatened after writing articles that expressed opinions or presented information that differed from government media.
On 23 February, a press secretary for the Justice Ministry’s Department of Corrections threatened to imprison Zokirova for a 12 February article about a woman’s prison in the city of Nurek, NANSMIT reported. On 2 March, she received a letter from Department of Corrections Director A.F. Rakhmonov who threatened “to take necessary measures” against her in response to the article, NANSMIT reported.
Government intimidation has also been reported in the case of dissident journalist Dodojon Atovulloyev. After fleeing during the civil war in 1992, he returned to Dushanbe at the end of June, but felt compelled to leave just four days later. Atovulloyev told CPJ in a telephone interview that several agents from Tajikistan’s security services questioned the manager of his hotel in Dushanbe. “They were asking where I go, whom I meet with and whom I visit,” Atovulloyev said.
Atovulloyev had published his opposition newspaper, “Charogi Ruz”, for a decade while in exile. The newspaper was officially banned in Tajikistan because of its critical reporting. The government lifted the ban in 2002, in part due to pressure from CPJ and other international media watchdogs (see alerts of 1 August and 26 June 2002, 13 and 9 July 2001). Atovulloyev now operates a website from Moscow called http://www.tajikistantimes.ru, which often criticizes the president. Site access for Tajik readers is sometimes blocked, Atovulloyev and several sources in Tajikistan told CPJ.
Taken together, these abusive actions reflect a broad campaign to silence media criticism against the president, the ruling party, the People’s Democratic Party of Tajikistan, and its parliamentary allies ahead of parliamentary elections scheduled for February 2005. Some journalists have linked these abuses to the Information Security Concept the president signed in November. In a 20 March speech on Tajik state television, the president said the Information Security Concept should be used to “coordinate the activities of the media,” according to a BBC translation of the speech.
Less than a decade after the 1992-97 civil war in Tajikistan, in which at least 29 journalists were murdered in reprisal for their work, reporters still work in fear. The ongoing campaign of harassment by government officials and other individuals is intensifying a culture of fear that has dominated the Tajik media for years.
A press suppressed by fear cannot play the role democracy demands, informing the public ahead of the parliamentary elections, CPJ stressed.
