A Tashkent regional appeals court on August 21, 2024, upheld a woman’s 30-month restricted freedom sentence for alleged anti-constitutional activity in gross violation of her right to freedom of expression, Human Rights Watch said. Sevara Shaydullaeva, 31, had sent her mother a video clip of Uzbekistan’s late President Islam Karimov speaking to Islamists in 1991, which she had downloaded from YouTube.
On April 30, a lower court had found Shaydullaeva guilty of “intentionally storing and distributing materials containing an open call to overthrow the constitutional order of Uzbekistan.” As part of her sentence, she is required to observe a curfew and not travel outside Tashkent region without permission, nor take part in any public events.
Shaydullaeva’s conviction rests on the conclusions of the State Committee for Religious Affairs of Uzbekistan, which the government had commissioned to analyze the contents of the video. The appeals court ruling indicates that there was no evidence that Shaydullaeva said or did anything to incite violence or overthrow the Uzbek government.
The video Shaydullaeva shared was filmed in 1991 and shows then-President Karimov addressing a crowd of Islamists in the eastern town of Namangan, and saying that he will consider their call for Uzbekistan to be governed “according to the rules of Islam,”.
The views Karimov espouses in the 1991 video stand in stark contrast to the abusive anti-Muslim policies that his administration enacted starting in the late 1990s, which continued until his death in 2016. President Karimov and his administration oversaw a prolonged and ruthless campaign against all Muslims who practiced their faith outside state controls.
Significant restrictions on freedom of religion and freedom of expression remain in effect under the administration of current President Shavkat Mirziyoyev.
Read more here.
