13.06.12 14:30
The opposition movement Birdamlik (Solidarity) on 12 June was going to hold a picket outside the Kyrgyz embassy to commemorate the 2011 events in the Kyrgyz town of Osh, but its members were detained
“About 15 people including four women gathered for the picket. Many of them came from Kashkadarya, Fergana Valley and other regions of Uzbekistan,” a member of the Bridamlik people’s movement, Malokhat Eshankulova, told Uznews.net.
The action participants said that they specially came to Tashkent “to protest against the Kyrgyz government, which is responsible for the June 2010 bloody events in the south of Kyrgyzstan and still running apartheid policy”.
Birdamlik had submitted a statement to the city authorities in advance notifying of their intention to stage a picket outside the Kyrgyz embassy, but the authorities ignored this statement.
At the same time, preparation for the picket had been made public and police were awaiting Birdamlik members near the Kyrgyz embassy.
“We approached the embassy at 11 o’clock in the morning but we did not even have time to unfold placards as police detained us immediately,” Eshankulova said.
Eyewitnesses, who live near the Kyrgyz embassy, said that the picket was finished quickly and decisively.
“The police in uniform shoved people into a bus in seconds,” says a 40-year-old woman on condition of anonymity.
According to her, she was so frightened to see this that she forgot what she was going to a shop and though it was best to return home.
Eshankulova also managed to tell Uznews.net on a cell phone that all the protesters had been brought to the Mirzo-Ulugbek District police department in Tashkent, where they await their fate. After that communication with her was lost.
“People are not protesting against the government of Uzbekistan but against actions of the leadership of the other country, so I do not understand why they were detained,” said Tashkent-based human rights activist Vladimir Khusainov.
According to him, what happened was nonsense in international practice.
Uznews.net