Uznews.net – Ethnic Uzbeks who want to leave southern Kyrgyzstan that has been drained in ethnic violence since 10 June are facing violations of their rights – mistreatment and robbery – even at the airport in Osh.

By Matlyuba Azamatova

On 23 July at Osh’s airport Kyrgyz police beat up two relatives – Bahtiyor Yakubov and Shukurullo Nasibullo-ugli – from the village of Shark in Kara-Suu District.

Yakubov, 28, said that he and his cousin Shukurullo arrived at the airport by 10 at night before the curfew started in order to see their relative Zakirjan off on a morning plane to Moscow.

They parked their car in a car park and remained in the car to wait for check-in to start because the airport’s waiting lounge cannot accommodate everyone wanting to leave Kyrgyzstan.

When the two young men were chatting, two Kyrgyz police officers approached them and after checking their passports they ordered them to follow the officers.

“They took away us to a distance of 50 or 60 metres from the car park and started beating us up,” Yakubov said, showing his injuries. “One officer kicked me in the leg and hit in my ear, and another officer added another 10 or 12 kicks.”

“I was beaten up even worse,” Nasibullo-ugli said. “The officers told us that we had violated the curfew and when they were beating us they said: ‘Sarts [derogatory for ethnic Uzbeks], what are you doing during the curfew, this is a lesson for you.’”

When the officers became tired of beating the young men, they demanded 5,000 soms ($106) from them and seized about 2,000 sums that they had on them.

“We decided to undergo medical checks and file a complaint with the commandant of Osh,” Yakubov said.

Ethnic violence, pogroms and killings of ethnic Uzbek that broke out in Osh and Jalalabad on 10 June have resulted in a powerful wave of emigration from southern Kyrgyzstan.

Many ethnic Uzbeks, who comprise 15% of Kyrgyzstan’s population and concentrate mainly in the country’s south, want to leave the Kyrgyz state, where they are facing arrests, beatings, torture, mistreatment and threats.

The only open route for Kyrgyzstan’s ethnic Uzbeks is to emigrate to Russia because neighbouring Uzbekistan is keeping its borders shut and does not want to accept ethnic Uzbek refugees.

According to Osh airport, 554 people, of whom 60% were ethnic Uzbeks, left for Moscow last Sunday alone. Between 300 and 350 ethnic Uzbeks left Osh between Monday and Thursday last week.

Emigration to Russia for ethnic Uzbeks is complicated by the need to obtain certificates and other permissions: people need to produce three documents to fly from Osh – a certificate of non-conviction, a certificate of no criminal prosecution and a certificate by a beat officer that the holder did not take part in the June events in southern Kyrgyzstan.

In order to obtain these certificates people have to bribe passport and police officials and each certificate costs 500 soms (about $10), a resident of Osh said.

Another problem is the purchase of a ticket to Moscow. Before the June events the ticket cost between 12,000 and 14,000 soms, whereas now its price has gone up to 17,000 soms.

Despite their high price, it is hard to obtain tickets. People sometimes have to pay up to 50,000 soms to buy them. Their relatives abroad cannot help either, as Osh airport personnel do not recognise e-tickets and e-ticket holders have to argue with them up until the boarding time.

Passengers sometimes are asked to pay bribes before the flight. A man said that he had to pay about $130 for boarding his plane without problems.

“You cannot do without it even if all documents are in order,” he said. “Ethnic Kyrgyz women are asked to identify criminals at the airport. Looking straight into your eyes, they may start screaming that it was exactly you who had robbed or raped them.”

“Jewellery and money are taken away from ethnic Uzbek women. All this is done to ethnic Uzbeks only – ethnic Russians, ethnic Kyrgyz and foreigners fly wherever they want without problems,” he added.

Many ethnic Uzbeks from Kyrgyzstan fly to Moscow, Novosibirsk or Krasnoyarsk, but they do not have the slightest idea of what life they will have in Russia. It is hard for them to leave their homes, even if they have now been reduced to rubble, but they cannot remain in Kyrgyzstan either.