KAZAKHSTAN
Workers’ leader arrested
By Bill Wayland
On April 6, Madel Ismailov, leader of the Kazakhstan
Workers Movement and a former construction worker, was again
imprisoned by the U.S.-backed dictatorship of Nursultan
Nazarbaev. He has gone on hunger strike to protest his
unconstitutional arrest.
Ismailov is charged with "addressing an illegal meeting,"
a rally against high prices and unemployment that was held on
Jan. 30 in the city of Almaty. On that day secret police
tried to grab Ismailov after the rally, but he was rescued by
the crowd.
On April 5, Ismailov was ordered to appear in court,
although a statute of limitations on the charge against him
had expired. When he arrived with his lawyer and friends, he
was told that they would not be allowed to go to court with
him. Ismailov refused to enter the court without
representation and returned home. He was arrested the
following morning and immediately sentenced to 15 days in
prison. The last time Ismailov was arrested--in 1998 for
"insulting the president"--he was also given a relatively
short sentence, but the regime refused to release him. He was
held for nearly a year in a concentration camp where he
almost died. Another KWM activist died as a result of poor
medical care in prison. Ismailov's friends and family feel
his life is in danger.
With 17 million people, Kazakhstan is the fourth most
populous republic of the former Soviet Union. It is rich in
oil and gas, and Exxon, Chevron and other U.S. oil companies
have large investments there. But coal, steel and other
industries that flourished in Soviet times have been
demolished on orders of the International Monetary Fund, and
whole regions of the country have been reduced to hunger. As
in other former Soviet republics, life expectancy has plunged
for working people. The prison population has mushroomed.
The Kazakhstan Workers Movement was formed to resist the
IMF-backed privatization policies of Nazarbayev's regime.
Although it has met all stated requirements, the regime has
refused to allow the KWM to register as a legal organization.
On April 15, U.S. Secretary of State Madeleine Albright will
visit Kazakhstan in a show of support for Nazarbayev's brutal
anti-labor policies.
Just before his latest arrest, Ismailov visited the United
States as part of a delegation of Kazakhstan opposition
leaders who met with members of Congress. While in the
States, Ismailov visited New York City, where he was hosted
by the International Action Center and met with former U.S.
Attorney General Ramsey Clark. In New York he also walked a
picket line to protest the police murder of unarmed Haitian
immigrant Patrick Dorismond.
The IAC is urging its friends and supporters to protest
Ismailov's imprisonment. Faxes may be sent to President
Nursultan Nazarbayev at 011-7-3172-326182, 011-7-3172-324769
or 011-7-3172-327274 and to Ambassador B. Nurgaliev at the
Embassy of the Republic of Kazakhstan in Washington at
202-232-5945. The embassy may be phoned at 202-232-5488.
Protests can also be faxed to U.S. Ambassador at Large for
Central Asia Stephen Sestanovich at the U.S. State Department
at 202-736-4710. Protest letters may also be e-mailed to the
IAC (iacenter@iacenter.org) and the IAC will fax them.
This article is copyright under a Creative
Commons License.
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Email: ww@workers.org
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