Kazakh Police Summarily Fine Baptists for Meeting to Worship Without Court Hearing
ICC NOTE: In new developments, Christians in Kazakhstan have been summarily fined by police for meeting to worship according to Forum 18. Prior to 2015, the act had not been used yet since then police authorities have taken it upon themselves to fine local Baptists without court hearings. Such authorities is too broad as it could be used for various other means as well as the targeting of other religious minorities. The actions are not one religion against another, it is more of a secularized government attempting to quell religious freedom where it can. The likely reason for it is due to its president who has held office since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. He has maintained an authoritarian rule of Kazakhstan for nearly three decades. While some would say it was required in the early days of the Soviet Union’s collapse, 2016 does not seem to be a year or decade where religious freedom restrictions and lack of due process are required.
7/19/2016 Kazakhstan (Forum 18) – In new development, three Council of Churches Baptists in Kazakhstan have been in 2016 fined by police without a court hearing, for meeting for worship without state permission. Human rights defenders know of no earlier cases since police acquired the power in January 2015.
In what appears to be a new development, three members of Council of Churches Baptist congregations in Kazakhstan are known to have been summarily fined by police officers without a court hearing so far in 2016, for meeting for worship without state permission. Prosecutors subsequently annulled one of the fines (see below). Baptists and human rights defenders are concerned that the new state tactic of summary police fines, to punish the exercise of freedom of religion or belief without state permission, might be used more widely.
“Such summary police fines haven’t been used against us before,” one Baptist – who has himself been fined and given short-term prison terms through the courts in earlier years – told Forum 18 on 12 July. “No one explained to us why they’ve suddenly started doing this.” Baptists state that such summary police fines without a court hearing have not been used against them previously.
The Baptist added that in one of the three cases, a police officer simply stated that he imposed the fine as he had been told by his superiors that he had this power (see below).
Local human rights defenders and journalists have also told Forum 18 that there are no presently known cases of such summary police fines without a court hearing being imposed before now. This applies to members of both religious or public organisations since the new police power came into force at the beginning of 2015.
The power to impose summary fines without initial due process was first given to police under the latest 2015 revision of the Code of Administrative Offences (see below). President Nursultan Nazarbayev has ordered even harsher revisions of the Religion Law and other laws to be prepared by mid-August 2016 (see F18News 14 June 2016http://www.forum18.org/archive.php?article_id=2188).