Uzbek rights activist gets seven-year jail term

(TASHKENT) - An Uzbekistan court Tuesday sentenced a rights activist and translator for New York-based Human Rights Watch to seven years in jail for distributing inflammatory publications, an HRW official said.

The Sergeli district court in Tashkent found Umida Niyazova, a 32-year-old Uzbek citizen, guilty of illegally crossing the border, smuggling and distributing publications threatening public order, the HRW representative, Andrea Berg, told AFP.

The trial came ahead of an EU decision to lift sanctions imposed after a bloody government crackdown in Andijan province in 2005.

Niyazova was arrested in January as she entered the country from Kyrgyzstan.

HRW has called the charges politically motivated and described her as the latest victim of a government crackdown on dissenters.

Niyazova pleaded guilty only on one count, that of illegally crossing the border. She denied other charges that were related to information stored in her laptop which was confiscated when she was initially detained in December 2006.

"She told the court that all materials in her computer were related to her 10 years of work as a rights activist and she had done nothing illegal," said Berg, who monitored the trial.

The materials that investigators labelled "dangerous" included an HRW report on the Andijan unrest in 2005 which was entitled "Bullets Were Falling Like Rain". It was based on interviews of victims and witnesses to the May 13 incident.

Uzbek authorities say that 187 people were killed in Andijan, all due to the actions of Islamic insurgents, while rights groups say that security forces killed hundreds of mainly unarmed protesters.

The EU imposed sanctions after Uzbekistan rejected western states demand for an international probe into the unrest and is due to consider dropping them this month.

On April 24 another rights defender, Gulbahor Turayeva from Andijan province was sentenced to six years in jail over anti-constitutional activities, slander, and producing and spreading materials that threaten the public order.