Photo: Talib Yakubov

Photo © Ferghana.Ru

Tashkent headquarters of Ozod Dekhkonlar, party of the opposition denied official registration by the authorities of Uzbekistan, housed a press conference on April 1. Talib Yakubov, Chairman of the Uzbek Society of Human Rights, confirmed the reports of spontaneous disturbances in the Dustlik district of the Dzhizak region sparked by the assault on the prominent opposition activist Egamnazar Shaimanov and his abduction.

According to Yakubov, several hundred of protesters demanding Shaimanov's return set fire to two service cars and ransacked a police station on the road leading to the district center of Arnasai. Dzhizak Khokim [governor] Ubaidulla Yamankulov personally met with the protesters and reassured them that Shaimanov would be found and returned, his abductors prosecuted. The governor even promised that the family of Amina Kambarova would be left alone. Sicced by the authorities, some thugs took Kambarova to the steppes on March 25 and kept her there for days on end. The promises given, the authorities invited the protesting dekhkans [peasants] for a meeting and treated them to pilau.

Some unidentified persons made another attempt to move Shaimanov to Dzhizak from the Tashkent Medical Institute on March 31. Yakubov said that Shaimanov had escaped and was currently "in a safe place" in Tashkent. Human rights activists will go on insisting on criminal charges against the Black Hundred thugs who assaulted and battered Shaimanov.

Yakubov's press conference was interrupted by Talat Shamsiyev of the mahallja committee [self-government body] of the Mirabad district of Tashkent.

"This press conference on the part of an unregistered political organization is illegitimate," Shamsiyev said. "It is this lack of organization of the political life that results in the events we recently witnessed in Georgia, Ukraine, and Kyrgyzstan."

"We applied to the Justice Ministry for registration but it did not deign to answer. According to the Roman Law legislation all over the world is based on, silence signifies consent. In other words, the authorities of Uzbekistan recognize existence of Ozod Dekhkonlar de facto," Yakubov replied.

Sultannazarov of Amir Temur mahallja tried to continue the debates over legitimacy of actions of the opposition. He announced that the intelligentsia and the wealthy were grossly dissatisfied with the political actions organized by unregistered organizations in the center of the capital. Those present asked Sultannazarov not to interfere, and the press conference ended peacefully. Even the observers posted by the authorities nearby left the vicinity soon.

Toying with the idea of using the method deployed by Yamankulov in Dzhizak where he put the opposition against "representatives of society" he himself had formed, the authorities apparently decided that the risk was not worth it and that the attempt might backfire. Pilau is better than blood, violence, riots, and pogroms - God forbid.

Staff correspondent Andrei Kudryashov (Tashkent)