Watchdog

QONAEV, Kazakhstan -- A court in Kazakhstan has denied early release for noted dissident Ermek Narymbaev (aka Narymbai), citing a violation of internal regulations allegedly committed by Narymbaev at the penal colony where he is incarcerated.

Narymbaev's lawyer, Zhanar Balghabaeva, told RFE/RL that the Qonaev City Court near Kazakhstan's largest city, Almaty, handed down its decision on December 14.

Court representatives were not available for immediate comment.

Narymbaev has been jailed several times for his political views and is known as a staunch critic of the tightly controlled former Soviet republic's government.

In 2016, he fled Kazakhstan for Ukraine after receiving death threats from unknown individuals. Narymbaev said at the time that the threats were masterminded by Kazakh authorities in a bid to intimidate him.

He returned to Kazakhstan in February after unprecedented anti-government rallies shook the Central Asian nation in early January, leaving at least 238 people dead.

He was arrested upon his arrival in Kazakhstan’s largest city, Almaty, and sent to prison for 30 months to serve the remainder of a previous suspended prison term he was handed in 2015 on a charge of inciting hatred, which he called politically motivated.

In October and November, Narymbaev held a hunger strike for 54 days to protest against his incarceration. He also demanded democratic reforms from the government. He lost 41 kilograms during the hunger strike.

The family of a Belgian aid worker jailed in Iran says that he has been sentenced to 28 years in prison by the Iranian judiciary for "espionage," a charge Brussels called "fabricated."

Olivier Van Steirtegem, a spokesperson for the family of Olivier Vandecasteele, told the AFP news agency on December 14 that they had been informed of the sentence at a meeting with Belgium's prime minister.

Shortly afterward, Belgian Justice Minister Vincent Van Quickenborne said in parliament in Brussels that the sentence was likely in retaliation for a jail sentence a court in Belgium handed to an Iranian diplomat last year.

"This is a compatriot who was innocently arrested in February and has been held under inhumane conditions since," he said of the 41-year-old Vandecasteele, who was detained by Iranian authorities in February.

Tehran has yet to confirm the news, but it comes after Belgium's constitutional court on December 8 suspended a prisoner exchange treaty with Iran. The accord had been heavily criticized by lawmakers and some in the public because it appeared to pave the way for Iranian diplomat Assadollah Assadi to be returned to Tehran.

Assadi was sentenced to 20 years in prison last year in connection with a plot to bomb a rally of the National Council of Resistance of Iran (NCRI), an exiled opposition group, outside Paris in June 2018. Tehran considers the NCRI a terrorist group and has called the Paris attack plot a "false flag" move by the group.

The Belgian government has said that the treaty is the only way to secure the release of the aid worker detained in Iran. The court ruled that the treaty was suspended pending a final ruling within three months.

Belgian opposition lawmakers have alleged that the agreement with Tehran was tailor-made to permit Assadi's release, while Iranian exiles have also mounted a fierce campaign against the deal, leading a group of 11 human rights organizations to appeal to Brussels to cancel the agreement.

According to the spokesman for the Vandecasteele family, there is "no alternative plan" for the prison sentence and "if no solution is found, Olivier will remain in prison until 2050, when he will be almost 70 years old."

Western countries have repeatedly charged that Iran is trying to take advantage of foreign countries by taking dual and foreign nationals hostage and then using them in prisoner swaps.

During a current wave of unrest sparked by the death of a young woman while she was detained for allegedly wearing a head scarf improperly, Iranian security forces have taken some 40 foreign nationals into custody, often without revealing any charges.

Written by Ardeshir Tayebi based on an original story in Persian by RFE/RL's Radio Farda