A day after searching the offices of the news website 24.kg, law enforcement officers in the Kyrgyz capital detained for questioning eight current and former members of the Temirov Live investigative group and the Ait Ait Dese project, as the government continues to pressure independent media, RFE/RL’s Kyrgyz Service reported.
Temirov Live’s founder, prominent investigative journalist Bolot Temirov, said the journalists who were detained for questioning after their homes and offices were searched on January 16 included his wife and the director of the Temirov Live group, Makhabat Tajybek-kyzy.
The Interior Ministry issued a statement, saying that the searches and detentions for questioning were linked to a probe launched into unspecified Temirov Live publications that “carried elements of calls for mass unrest.”
Temirov said that Temirov Live reporters Sapar Akunbekov, Azamat Ishenbekov, and Aike Beishekeeva, as well as former journalists of the group Aktilek Kaparov, Tynystan Asypbek, Saipidin Sultanaliev, and Joodar Buzumov, also had their homes searched.
Temirov, who was deported to Moscow in November 2022 after a court ruled that he illegally obtained Kyrgyz citizenship, which he denies, added that two other employees of the Temirov Live group, whom he identified as Maksat and Jumabek, were detained.
Kyrgyzstan’s civil society and independent media have traditionally been the most vibrant in Central Asia, but that has changed amid a deepening government crackdown.
Just a day earlier, officers of the State Committee for National Security detained for questioning the director-general of the 24.kg news website, Asel Otorbaeva, and two editors, Makhinur Niyazova and Anton Lymar, in a case of “propagating war” in an unspecified report about Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. The three were later released but ordered not to reveal details of the case.
Lawmaker Janar Akaev called the moves against the journalists “an attack on freedom of speech.”
“Such types of situations lead to self-censorship, and obstruct investigative reports on political and corruption issues,” Akaev said, adding that the latest developments around independent journalists will be raised at parliament’s next session.
Another lawmaker, Nurjigit Kadyrbekov, told RFE/RL that the ongoing pressure on independent journalists “could damage the president’s image.”
