30 March 2009

Alert

Journalist Aziz Myrzabayev attacked, his camera stolen after filming police raid


Incident details

Aziz Myrzabayev

journalist(s)

assaulted
(CJES/IFEX) - Aziz Myrzabayev, a journalist with the Otyrar television channel in Shymkent, South Kazakhstan province, took part in a police raid under editorial assignment in the early hours of 17 March 2009.

During the raid, the police pulled over a car with no license plates. The people in the car demanded that the journalist stop filming them and started threatening him. The journalist says they even fired several shots in the air with an Osa pistol.

When Myrzabayev was returning home from work, he was attacked by five men, who were later joined by ten others. The men beat him and took his camera. Myrzabayev sustained bruises from the attack.

The journalist and Vyacheslav Shvarts, deputy director of the limited liability company Sobcor, who is the founder of the television channel, believe the attackers were looking to destroy the videos taken by the journalist during the raid.

Myrzabayev reported the attack to the police, who have opened an investigation into the incident. To date, one of the attackers has been arrested.



Source:

Center for Journalism in Extreme Situations
4 Zubovsky Bulvar
Moscow 119992
Russia
center (@) cjes.ru
Phone: +7 495 645 61 23 / +7 495 645 61 24
Fax: +7 495 637 76 26
 

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Kazakhstan

Make rights key to good relations, says Human Rights Watch 6 February 2012 Security service interrogates editor, raids newsroom 3 February 2012 Independent editor imprisoned 26 January 2012 Independent editor detained, newsrooms raided 25 January 2012 Journalists prevented from covering violent clashes in Zhanaozen; ARTICLE 19 outlines necessary reforms 19 December 2011 See all alerts: Kazakhstan


 
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