FORUM 18 NEWS SERVICE, Oslo, Norway
The right to believe, to worship and witness
The right to change one’s belief or religion
The right to join together and express one’s belief
===============================================
Wednesday 5 February 2014
KAZAKHSTAN: “WE’RE LIQUIDATING THE [MOSQUE] COMMUNITY”
Kazakhstan’s Din-Muhammad Tatar-Bashkir Mosque, built in 1852, is being
forcibly closed. Yesterday evening (4 February), three officials of a
Liquidation Commission appointed by a court to dissolve the community
arrived at the Mosque in Petropavl to prepare an inventory of all its
possessions. “The mosque is to be handed over to another religious
organisation”, Marat Zhamaliyev, deputy head of the regional Finance
Department, told Forum 18 News Service. He refused to say which religious
community the mosque will be given to. Told by Forum 18 that the mosque
community still exists, regularly holds the namaz (prayers) in the mosque
(including this morning, 5 February) and intends to continue to exist,
Zhamaliyev responded: “We’re not liquidating the mosque, we’re liquidating
the community.” He insisted that that the juridical community had been
liquidated by a court and therefore did not exist. The Din-Muhammad Mosque
may possibly be the last remaining publicly-accessible mosque independent
of the state-backed Muslim Board.
KAZAKHSTAN: “WE’RE LIQUIDATING THE [MOSQUE] COMMUNITY”
By Felix Corley, Forum 18 News Service
Kazakhstan’s Din-Muhammad Tatar-Bashkir Mosque – built in 1852, forcibly
closed down in the 1930s under Stalin, and reopened after the end of the
Soviet Union – is being forcibly closed down again. Yesterday evening (4
February), three officials of a Liquidation Commission appointed by a court
to dissolve the community arrived at the Mosque in Petropavl
[Petropavlovsk], in North Kazakhstan Region to prepare an inventory of all
its possessions. “The mosque is to be handed over to another religious
organisation,” Marat Zhamaliyev, deputy head of the regional Finance
Department, insisted to Forum 18 News Service on 5 February.
“The religious community has been liquidated”
Zhamaliyev vigorously denied that officials were confiscating the
Din-Muhammad Tatar-Bashkir Mosque community’s property. “The property will
shortly be handed over as communal property to the state,” he told Forum
18, “because the religious community has been liquidated.”
Told by Forum 18 that the mosque community still exists, regularly holds
the namaz (prayers) in the mosque building (including this morning, 5
February) and intends to continue to exist, Zhamaliyev responded: “We’re
not liquidating the mosque, we’re liquidating the community.”
Zhumaliyev declined to say which other religious community and of what
religious affiliation officials intend to give the mosque to. Asked who had
given the state the right to take a place of worship away from one
community and give it to any other, he responded: “The law.” He insisted
that as the Din-Muhammad Tatar-Bashkir Mosque community had failed to gain
the compulsory re-registration, it had to be liquidated.
Asked by Forum 18 why the community repeatedly had its re-registration
application rejected and why the community cannot continue to exist and
meet for worship without registration without being expelled from the
mosque building, Zhumaliyev repeated that the juridical community had been
liquidated by the court and therefore did not exist. “No-one is banning
people from praying,” he insisted. “People can go to pray in the new
community.”
The Din-Muhammad Mosque may possibly be the last remaining
publicly-accessible mosque independent of the state-backed Muslim Board,
Forum 18 notes (see F18News 2 October 2013
).
Muslims subjected to tightest controls
Kazakhstan’s Muslims are subjected to even tighter state controls than
members of other religious communities. All Muslim communities must be part
of the state-backed Muslim Board. No independent mosques or Shia Muslim
communities have been given state permission to exist. Neither have any
Ahmadi Muslim communities, all of whom having been forcibly closed by the
state. The Muslim Board’s spokesperson told Forum 18 that all Islamic
communities “must be Hanafi Sunni Muslim”. “We don’t have other sorts of
Muslims here”, he added (see F18News 23 November 2012
). The Din-Muhammad
Mosque is Hanafi Sunni, but independent.
The state also subjects Muslim communities to special language restrictions
which do not apply to other faiths – official demand that they use Kazakh
rather than the language of their choice (Russian, Tatar, Chechen, Azeri)
for sermons. Unlike communities of other faiths (Russian Orthodox, Armenian
Apostolic, Jewish) they cannot have an ethnic affiliation in their name.
The Din-Muhammad Mosque’s efforts to be negotiate an exception were
rejected (see F18News 2 October 2013
).
“It’s no longer your property”
In the early evening of 4 February three Liquidation Commission officials
arrived unannounced at the mosque for the inventory. They were Aubakir
Karmenov of the Religious Affairs Department of the Regional Akimat
(administration) and two officials of the Rehabilitation and Bankruptcy
Department of the Regional Tax Committee, its head Nurzhan Kaisenov and a
chief specialist Lyudmila Bryksina.
Karmenov was the Religious Affairs Department official who had delayed
consideration of the community’s re-registration application and who lodged
the liquidation suit to court after it was rejected. He also represented
the Department in court at liquidation hearings, according to court
documents seen by Forum 18.
“We had asked them to let us know in advance if they were intending to
come,” one community member told Forum 18 from Petropavl on 5 February.
“But it was better for them if we didn’t know.”
The three officials counted and listed the carpets on the floor of the
prayer hall, the copies of the Koran in Arabic, Tatar, Russian and other
languages, furniture and lumps of coal.
“We’ve never counted the carpets, but there must be about 200,” the
community member told Forum 18. “These are the personal property of
individuals – and their names are marked on the back of each.” Some of
those who provided the carpets have since died, the community member added.
Officials told mosque members present: “It’s no longer your property”.
Karmenov told them that the building would remain a mosque, but would be
handed to another community. He added that sermons would in future be held
only in Kazakh, not in Russian and Tatar as at present.
One mosque member, Artur Temerzhanov, posted video of the 4 February
inventory on YouTube (). The
video shows Bryksina sitting at a desk in the prayer hall listing the
carpets as Karmenov and Kaisenov turn them over one by one and read out the
names.
“The mosque and everything in it is private property,” one mosque member
insisted to Forum 18.
“We’re not preparing to confiscate the property”?
“We’re not preparing to confiscate the property,” Kaisenov of the
Rehabilitation and Bankruptcy Department claimed to Forum 18 from Petropavl
on 5 February. “We simply did an inventory for the liquidation.” He
insisted he and his colleagues could do “nothing else” as a court had
ordered the community’s liquidation.
Kaisenov added that the head of the Finance Department of North Kazakhstan
Region, Esken Akimzhanov, and his deputy Zhamaliyev have not yet told him
what will happen to the mosque community’s property. But he noted that many
of those who had given carpets to the mosque had died. He was unable to
explain why that gave officials the right to take them from the community.
Chief specialist Bryksina, who compiled the inventory in the mosque,
declined to discuss her role. “I am not authorised to answer questions from
journalists,” she told Forum 18 on 5 February.
Despite repeated calls to the Religious Affairs Department, Forum 18 was
unable to reach Karmenov on 5 February. His colleagues said he was out of
the office visiting the Akimat.
Karmenov’s colleague, Department chief specialist Bolat Omarov, defended
the officials’ action. “A Liquidation Commission was formed – it’s just
listing the property,” he told Forum 18 on 5 February. “No-one is
confiscating anything.”
Omarov categorically denied that any order had come down from the capital
Astana banning the re-registration of any mosques which choose not to be
subordinate to the state-backed Muslim Board. “There could never be such an
order,” he claimed. He insisted that the only reason the Tatar-Bashkir
Mosque had been denied re-registration was because of “mistakes” in the
application.
Opened in 19th century, forcibly closed in 21st century
The Din-Muhammad Mosque is mainly attended by ethnic Tatars and Bashkirs.
It was built in 1852 and has been open since, apart from when it was closed
during Soviet-era repression of freedom of religion or belief. The mosque
community lodged a re-registration application before the Religion Law’s
October 2012 deadline, receiving no official response (see F18News 7
December 2012 ).
The Din-Muhammad Mosque community and its imam have since faced heavy state
pressure because they wish to exercise their freedom of religion or belief.
For example, on the night of 20 December 2012 the ARA telephoned the Imam
and some elderly members of the community for an 09.00 meeting with the
Head of North Kazakhstan Region’s administration Serik Bilyalov. He
threatened them that if they did not join the Muslim Board the community
would be liquidated and the mosque would be taken over by the local
authorities who would use it for some public non-religious purpose. A
central ARA official claimed to Forum 18 that “there is no pressure on the
mosques” (see F18News 25 January 2013
).
Members of the Mosque community continued to gather for prayers in their
19th century mosque, even after a 12 September 2013 court decision
rejecting an appeal against compulsory liquidation ordered on 20 February
2013. The appeal court ordered officials to complete the liquidation
quickly. Attendance at prayers dropped from hundreds to tens because
“people are afraid of the authorities”, community members told Forum 18
(see F18News 2 October 2013 (see F18News
).
“Any Muslim organisation can register”?
Despite claiming that “any Muslim organisation can register”, Bakhytzhan
Kulekeyev, Director of the Agency of Religious Affairs’ (ARA) Interfaith
Relations Department, admitted to Forum 18 from Astana on 5 February that
only one Muslim organisation – the Muslim Board – gained re-registration
after the adoption of the 2011 Religion Law. But he then claimed that
mosques of other affiliations had failed to gain re-registration only
because of “technical reasons”.
Kulekeyev claimed that a Shia mosque in Astana had lodged a registration
application “this week”. He declined to identify the community or to say if
it would be allowed to gain state registration outside the framework of the
Muslim Board. He claimed that two other Shia mosques in Almaty and one in
Zhambyl function as prayer rooms (namazkhanas) registered by local Akimats.
Asked about the enforced liquidation of the Tatar-Bashkir Mosque in
Petropavl, Kulekeyev claimed they had been denied re-registration because
“they couldn’t write a normal statute”. He declined to discuss any other
aspect of the liquidation of the mosque community.
Kulekeyev absolutely denied that any ban existed on mosques holding sermons
in languages other than Kazakh. This contradicts repeated statements to
Forum 18 from members of the Tatar-Bashkir Mosque.
State-backed Muslim monopoly
No published law appears to give the Muslim Board a monopoly over all
Muslim activity in Kazakhstan. No published law appears to prevent the
state registration of Muslim organisations independently of the Muslim
Board. But even a year before the Religion Law was adopted, state officials
obstructed the functioning of mosques catering mainly to members of one
ethnic group, such as the Tatars and Bashkirs (see F18News 4 November 2010
). Officials also
threatened to close all independent mosques using the Religion Law a year
before it was passed (see F18News 14 October 2010
).
An Agreement between the ARA and the Muslim Board, signed by ARA head Marat
Azilkhanov and Chief Mufti Yerzhan Mayamerov in Almaty on 15 January,
implicitly recognises the Board’s monopoly. Article 2, Part 2 specifies
that the Board “preaches and explains among believers the norms of the
Islamic faith in accordance with the Hanafi school and the theological
school of [Samarkand-born Islamic scholar] al-Maturidi”. The Agreement does
not explain why it is the role of the state to determine the theological
orientation of a religious community.
The Agreement also obliges the Muslim Board to work with the ARA in
religious education and publishing. Again, it is not explained why it is
the role of a state agency to determine what a religious community might
wish to teach and publish.
The Muslim Board’s monopoly has prevented Moscow-based imam Shamil
Alyautdinov from presenting his books in Kazakhstan because it – as the
only legally registered Islamic organisation – refuses to invite him (see
F18News 23 January 2014
).
No other local religious community has such an Agreement requiring state
intervention in its activity. But Catholic communities have been given
different treatment to other communities in state decisions on whether they
are allowed to exist. Explaining different treatment for Catholics under an
Agreement with the Holy See, hastily ratified in 2012 a Justice Ministry
official in November 2012 told Forum 18 that international agreements
override the Religion Law. But he did not explain why this reasoning does
not also apply to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights,
whose provisions would abolish most of the Religion Law including its
provisions on compulsory state registration to exercise human rights (see
F18News 22 November 2012
).
Systemic state violations of freedom of religion or belief
The closure of independent and ethnic mosques such as the Tatar-Bashkir
Din-Muhammad Mosque in Petropavl is part of a wider pattern of systemic
Kazakh government violations of freedom of religion or belief and other
human rights.
Two laws imposing severe restrictions on freedom of religion or belief and
breaking the country’s human rights obligations came into force in October
2011. A new Religion Law among other restrictions imposes a complex
four-tier registration system, bans unregistered religious activity, and
imposes compulsory state censorship of religious literature and objects. A
new Administrative Code Article 375 (“Violation of the Religion Law”) –
replacing the previous Article 375 – was introduced at the same time in an
Amending Law. It punishes a wide range of often unclearly defined
“offences” with possible fines for individuals and groups with
state-registration, and bans on the activity of “guilty” religious groups
(see F18News 23 September 2011
).
Since the Religion Law was passed, all mosques outside state control are
being closed down. The imam and members of an independent mosque denied
re-registration after intense state pressure – who asked not to be
identified for fear of state reprisals – told Forum 18 that when they met
to discuss applying for new registration, officials “came out of nowhere”
and threatened them with punishment (see F18News 2 October 2013
).
Followers of a very wide range of religions and beliefs are targeted by the
state for human rights violations. The criminal case launched against
retired Presbyterian pastor Bakhytzhan Kashkumbayev in July 2011 is still
proceeding, having finally reached court on 22 January 2014. Similarly, the
criminal investigation of atheist writer Aleksandr Kharlamov also
continues. Both have been subjected to arrest, detention and forcible
psychiatric examination (see F18News 22 January 2014
).
Four people – all Baptists – have been jailed in 2014 alone for refusing to
pay fines handed down in 2013 to punish them for exercising freedom of
religion or belief without state permission. Numerous fines continue to be
imposed under Administrative Code Article 375 for this “offence” (see eg.
F18News 28 January 2014
. In 2013 alone, over
149 people are known to have been fined for exercising this
internationally-recognised human right (see F18News 11 November 2013
).
Among the many targets of state censorship of religious literature and
objects, including bans on bookshops selling of such items without state
permission, have been Russian Orthodox icons. After 12 icons and three
Bibles were seized from a commercial bookseller in Oral (Uralsk) in West
Kazakhstan Region, the bookseller is due to face an administrative court
where he may be fined several weeks’ average wages and the icons and Bibles
might be ordered destroyed. “Everything is OK now – he has agreed not to
sell religious materials,” Salamat Zhumagulov, the state religious affairs
official who seized the items, told Forum 18. The ARA spokesperson Saktagan
Sadvokasov claimed that “the Kazakh state must defend our citizens from
harmful materials”. Asked by Forum 18 whether he has known icons which are
harmful, he replied: “We have experts to check icons” (see F18News 8
January 2014 ). (END)
Reports on freedom of thought, conscience and belief in Kazakhstan can be
found at
.
For more background, see Forum 18’s Kazakhstan religious freedom survey at
.
For a personal commentary from 2005 on how attacking religious freedom
damages national security in Kazakhstan, see F18News
.
A compilation of Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe
(OSCE) freedom of religion or belief commitments can be found at
.
A printer-friendly map of Kazakhstan is available at
.
All Forum 18 News Service material may be referred to, quoted from, or
republished in full, if Forum 18 is credited as the
source.
© Forum 18 News Service. All rights reserved. ISSN 1504-2855.