Security forces accused of rape and torture - Uzbekistan

Tashkent - A recent spate of suicide blasts and shoot-outs in Uzbekistan has prompted a wave of arbitrary arrests and the reported use of torture including rape by the security forces, Human Rights Watch said on Wednesday.

"The arrests indicate a broadening of the governments crack down on non-violent independent Muslims - police appear to have been given carte blanche," Rachel Denber, Human Rights Watch's Europe and Central Asia director, said in a written statement.

The New York-based rights watchdog said it had documented the detention by Uzbekistan's secular authorities of 40 people, including 13 women and five minors.

http://www.iol.co.za/index.php?click_id=3&art_id=qw1081929602385B221&set_id=1

Tony Blair's new friend
Britain and the US claim a moral mandate - and back a dictator who
boils victims to death

http://www.guardian.co.uk/comment/story/0,3604,1072313,00.html

<snip>


There are over 6,000 political and religious prisoners in Uzbekistan.
Every year, some of them are tortured to death. Sometimes the
policemen or intelligence agents simply break their fingers, their
ribs and then their skulls with hammers, or stab them with
screwdrivers, or rip off bits of skin and flesh with pliers, or drive
needles under their fingernails, or leave them standing for a
fortnight, up to their knees in freezing water. Sometimes they are a
little more inventive. The body of one prisoner was delivered to his
relatives last year, with a curious red tidemark around the middle of
his torso. He had been boiled to death.

<snip>

So, far from seeking to isolate his regime, the US government has
tripled its aid to Karimov. Last year, he received $500m (£300m), of
which $79m went to the police and intelligence services, who are
responsible for most of the torture. While the US claims that its
engagement with Karimov will encourage him to respect human rights,
like Saddam Hussein he recognises that the protection of the world's
most powerful government permits him to do whatever he wants. Indeed,
the US state department now plays a major role in excusing his crimes.
In May, for example, it announced that Uzbekistan had made
"substantial and continuing progress" in improving its human rights
record. The progress? "Average sentencing" for members of peaceful
religious organisations is now just "7-12 years", while two years ago
they were "usually sentenced to 12-19 years".

sarcasm off