Kazakh NGOs ask president to veto new Criminal Code
ALMATY. June 11 (Interfax) - A number of Kazakh non-governmental organizations have signed a petition to the president to veto a new Criminal Code, Criminal Procedure Code, Penal Code, and Code of Administrative Offences passed by the parliament.
"Contrary to your suggestions, the Criminal Code, Criminal Procedure Code, Penal Code, and Code of Administrative Offences passed by the parliament significantly restrict and infringe upon human rights, which goes against the republic's constitution and ratified international treaties," says the petition circulated on Wednesday by the Adil Soz freedom of speech defense foundation.
In particular, the authors point out that the new Criminal Code openly violates the people's right to freedom of association, as it contains a new discriminatory definition, i.e. 'leader of a public association' as a special subject of a crime, which may lead to the persecution of any members of public associations, especially their activists, based on arbitrary presumption of their leadership.
The Criminal Code article dealing with 'Illegal interference of members of non-governmental associations in activities of government agencies', because of a lack of clear and unambiguous interpretation of notions contained in it would provide the chance for unscrupulous officials to interpret any just demand by members of non-governmental associations acting on the public's behalf as illegal interference in their activities and would put an end to public control in the country, the petition says.
At all stages of work on the new draft codes, civil society activists tried to bring the provisions of these documents into line with the Kazakh Constitution and international law concerning human rights, "progressive foreign practices and international trends in the area of human rights protection," the petition says. "However, most of the public's proposals and arguments have been ignored," it says.
Apart from vetoing the codes, the authors of the petition asked the president to exclude the law enforcement agencies from the number of institutions drawing up the new draft codes, as they are guided by narrow departmental interests and the desire to get rid of public control as much as possible.
In addition, the petition authors asked the president to make sure that the new draft codes undergo national public and international expert analysis.
In addition to Adil Soz, the petition was signed by the Kazakhstan International Human Rights and Rule of Law Bureau, the public foundations Charter for Human Rights, International Legal Initiative, the Foundation of Parliamentarianism Development in Kazakhstan, and other organizations.