ALMATY, Kazakhstan -- Members of the unregistered Naghyz Atazhurt (Real Fatherland) party in Kazakhstan said on August 7 that authorities had recently increased pressure on the party's activists by leveling fines and arresting the party's leaders.
Party member Nazigul Maqsutkhan said at a press conference in Almaty that in the last 12 months the party's activists had been ordered to pay fines estimated at 5 million tenges (about $10,500), which is a significant sum for Kazakhs.
"Among other things, our colleagues were found guilty of leading, being a member of, and financing an unregistered party. By that, the authorities impose more obstacles for our efforts to register the party," Maqsutkhan said, adding that one person had been ordered to pay 780,400 tenges (about $1,630) for wiring 2,000 tenges ($4) to the Naghyz Atazhurt party.
Among other examples of pressure imposed on the unregistered party, Maqsutkhan mentioned the arrest last week of party leader Bekzat Maqsutkhan, who was sentenced to 10 days in jail on a charge of violating regulations for holding public events.
The charge stemmed from Bekzat Maqsutkhan's participation in rallies supporting journalist Duman Mukhammedkarim, who was sentenced to seven years in prison on August 2 for financing an extremist group and participating in a banned group's activities, charges he and his supporters reject as politically motivated.
Naghyz Atazhurt's leaders and activists have been trying to register as a political party since May 2022.
Initially, the party was involved in defending the rights of ethnic Kazakhs in China's northwestern region of Xinjiang.
In 2022, its activists announced a plan to become a political party "to contribute to the process of the democratic political system while taking into account the Kazakh people's traditions, language, and national characteristics."
Naghyz Atazhurt, formerly known as Atazhurt Eriktileri (Volunteers of the Fatherland), has campaigned for the release of ethnic Kazakhs held in so-called reeducation camps in Xinjiang.
The United Nations has said an estimated 1 million ethnic Uyghurs and other mostly Turkic-speaking Muslim indigenous people of Xinjiang, including Kazakhs, are being held in what it described as "counterextremism centers" in Xinjiang.
The UN also said millions more had been forced into internment camps.
China maintains that the facilities are "centers for vocational education and training."