ALMATY, Kazakhstan -- The jailed leader of the unregistered Democratic Party of Kazakhstan, Zhanbolat Mamai, has been transferred to house arrest.
Mamai's relatives, colleagues, and supporters greeted him on November 2 at the gates of a detention center in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city. He was then brought home by police.
Also on November 2, the Bostandyq district court in Almaty set November 7 as the date of Mamai's trial.
The 34-year-old Mamai was arrested in late February. He faces up to 10 years in prison on charges of organizing mass riots and knowingly disseminating false information during protests in January, which he and his supporters reject as politically motivated.
In August, the European Parliament’s Subcommittee on Human Rights (DROI) called on Kazakh authorities to release Mamai and other political prisoners and stop the criminal prosecution of those who died during unrest in the Central Asian nation in January.
Amnesty International and Human Rights Watch have urged Kazakh authorities to release Mamai and drop all charges against him, calling them politically motivated.
Mamai, known for his harsh criticism of the nation's authoritarian government, has been trying to register the Democratic Party of Kazakhstan but claims he is being prevented from doing so by the government. He says officials only permit parties loyal to the political powers to be legally registered.
Kazakhstan was ruled by authoritarian President Nursultan Nazarbaev from its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 until current President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev succeeded him in 2019.
Over the past three decades, several opposition figures have been killed and many jailed or forced to flee the tightly controlled former Soviet republic.
Toqaev recently broadened his powers after Nazarbaev and his family left the oil-rich nation's political scene following the deadly anti-government protests in January.
The unrest, which started over a fuel-price hike, quickly spread across Kazakhstan because of discontent over the cronyism that had long plagued the country. At least 238 people, including 19 law enforcement officers, were killed during the dispersal of the protests by security forces and police.
Several participants in the protests have been handed lengthy prison terms across the country in recent months on charges of organizing mass disturbances and riots.
Mamai's transfer to house arrest comes hours after Toqaev signed a decree granting mass amnesty to hundreds of people charged and imprisoned in connection with the January protests.
Rights activists have said that the mass amnesty was initiated to help law enforcement officers who opened fire at unarmed demonstrators evade accountability.