TALDYQORGHAN, Kazakhstan -- The former chief of police of Kazakhstan's southern Almaty region, General Serik Kudebaev, who was recently extradited from Turkey, has been handed a 10-year prison term in a case related to the deadly mass unrest that rocked the country in January 2022.
A court in the regional capital, Taldyqorghan, sentenced Kudebaev on April 28 after finding him guilty of failing to take action during the unrest in the Central Asian country's largest city, Almaty.
Kudebaev pleaded not guilty.
"I am innocent, I did not shoot my people. I did not shoot women and children. I was not involved in torture. Victims are confirming it. That is all I want to say. Thank you," Kudebaev said in his final statement to the court before the verdict and sentence were announced.
Kudebaev was arrested in May and later released but ordered not to leave Almaty as investigations into the case against him were under way.
Kazakh authorities issued an international arrest warrant for Kudebaev after he failed to show up at his trial in March.
Almaty regional police said then that Kudebaev might have illegally crossed the Kazakh-Kyrgyz border in late March and left Kyrgyzstan from the airport in Bishkek for Turkey.
On April 27, the Kazakh Prosecutor-General's Office said Kudebaev had been apprehended and extradited to Kazakhstan recently.
Kudebaev is one of dozens of former law enforcement officials and individuals close to former President Nursultan Nazarbaev to face various charges following January 2022 anti-government protests that were violently dispersed, leaving at least 238 people dead.
Earlier this week, a court in Astana handed former National Security Committee (KNB) chief Karim Masimov, who was known as one of Nazarbaev's close allies, an 18-year prison term on charges of high treason, attempting to seize power by force, and abuse of office and power.
Masimov's former deputies, Anuar Sadyqulov, Daulet Erghozhin, and Marat Osipov, were sentenced to 16, 15, and three years in prison respectively at the same trial.
President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev has made a series of moves since the unrests to push Nazarbaev, who ruled the tightly controlled former Soviet republic with an iron fist for almost three decades, further into the background following his resignation in 2019.
Though he officially stepped down as president, Nazarbaev retained sweeping powers as the head of the country's powerful Security Council. He also enjoyed substantial powers by holding the title of "elbasy," or leader of the nation.
In the wake of the deadly unrest last year, Toqaev stripped Nazarbaev of his Security Council role, taking it over himself. Since then, several of Nazarbaev’s relatives and allies have been pushed out of their positions or resigned. Some relatives faced criminal charges.
In mid-February, Toqaev signed a law that canceled Nazarbayev's elbasy title.
Kazakh critics say Toqaev's moves were cosmetic and did not change the nature of the autocratic system in a country that has been plagued for years by rampant corruption and nepotism.