Prominent Uzbek rights defender on trial amid secrecy

A prominent human rights defender and witness to the bloodshed in the eastern Uzbek city of Andijan last May has gone on trial charged with defamation and anti-government activities, relatives and a rights group said on Jan. 12. Saidjahon Zaynobiddinov, the founder of the Appeal rights group in Andijan, was arrested within a week of the suppressed armed uprising in Andijan after he recounted his version of events in the city to some Western media outlets. He said that he had witnessed the killings of civilians, including women and children, by government troops and estimated the death toll to be considerably higher than the 187 fatalities that the government claims. Some say up to 1,000 people were killed by Uzbek security forces during and immediately after the uprising. Tashkent had repeatedly turned down requests for an independent inquiry into Andijan. "We found out about the trial from his lawyer who received notification that the trial had started in Tashkent province in early January," Ilhom, Zaynobiddinov's son, told IRIN from Andijan. "But we don't know where the trial is, whether it is currently under way or not, or where my father is being kept," the son added. The Initiative Group of Independent Human Rights Defenders of Uzbekistan–a key rights watchdog–said that no official information about Zaynobiddinov's trial was available. "I think this is a closed trial, no relatives were invited, no official information about his trial is available–this is a clear infringements of the criminal code," Surat Ikramov, the head of the group said. Another lawyer in Andijan said that the court may have already convicted him. Court officials were not available for comment. Zaynobiddinov was among dozens of rights defenders and independent journalists who were arrested or left the country following the government crackdown on dissent after the Andijan unrest. The United Nations, the European Union and the United States have criticized Uzbekistan for its handling of the unrest and its subsequent convictions on "terrorism" charges of at least 151 civilians allegedly involved, most of them in closed trials.