Jailed Kazakh Opposition Leader's Wife Says His Rights Violated

Vladimir Kozlov

ALMATY, Kazakhstan -- The wife of the jailed chairman of Kazakhstan's unregistered opposition Algha (Forward) party says her husband's rights as a prisoner are being violated.

Aliya Turysbekova, wife of Vladimir Kozlov, told journalists in Almaty on February 13 that National Security Committee officers had not allowed her to meet with her husband and refused to accept food and clothes she has been trying to pass to him since his arrest.

Turysbekova also said Kozlov's lawyer has not been allowed to talk to his client face-to-face since he was incarcerated.

No comment on the allegations was available from Kazakh authorities.

The National Security Committee arrested Kozlov on January 26 and charged him with "inciting social hatred" in the southwestern town of Zhanaozen, where at least 16 striking oil workers were shot dead by police in mid-December.