Interior Ministry pays compensation to Khoushvakht Qayumov

The Interior Ministry has paid compensation to Khoushvakht Qayumov who underwent torture at Yovon police station several years ago.

Lawyer Gulchehra Kholmatova, who represented Khoushvakht Qayumov in court, says the Interior Ministry paid 16,000 somoni to Khoushvakht Qayumov on April 21.

“This amount, however, is unfair and not enough compared to physical and moral suffering my client underwent at the police station, and we will appeal the court’s decision” the lawyer said.     

We will recall that Mashraf Aliyev, then officer of Yovon district police in the southern Khatlon province, on April 27, 2012 summoned the 17-year-old Khoushvakht Qayumov from the village of Kulobod to the district police station, where he beat and kicked the young man and threatened to torture him with electric shock unless he confessed to a theft.  Khoushvakht Qayumov insisted he was innocent.  Mashraf Aliyev let him go home in the evening, but demanded that he return the next day.  On April 28, the beatings continued and Khoushvakht Qayumov eventually signed a “confession” in order to avoid further abuse.  Mashraf Aliyev threatened that Khoushvakht Qayumov would be beaten by 200 policemen if he later retracted his confession.  Devastated by the experience of abuse, Khoushvakht Qayumov decided to commit suicide.  On April 29, his relatives found him hanging from the ceiling of the family’s barn in an unconscious state.  They were able to save his life by quickly arranging for him to be taken to the local hospital.

On April 30, 2012, the Prosecutor’s Office of the Yovon district instituted criminal proceedings against Mashraf Aliyev for “torture” (Article 143-1, part 2 of the Criminal Code of Tajikistan) and “exceeding official powers” (Article 316, part 1 of the Criminal Code).  On September 7, 2012, the Yovon district court found the officer guilty of committing these crimes and sentenced him to seven years’ imprisonment.  On the initiative of the Chairman of the Supreme Court of Tajikistan, the case was sent for additional investigation on February 19, 2013.  On December 11, 2013, the Qurghon Teppa city court found Mashraf Aliyev guilty of the crime of “torture” under Article 143-1, part 3 of the Criminal Code of Tajikistan, which punishes torture that has severe consequences including to a person’s health.  It sentenced Mashraf Aliyev to seven years’ imprisonment, to be served in a high-security penal colony.  In October 2014, a claim for 300,000 somoni was lodged against the Ministry of Internal Affairs of Tajikistan to compensate for moral damages suffered by Khoushvakht Qayumov as a result of torture.  Mashraf Aliyev’s prison sentence was reduced to three years in early 2015 as a result of applying amnesty laws and on April 30, 2015, a court in Dushanbe’s Sino district ordered that he be transferred to a settlement colony, a less strict type of colony than where he was held before, to serve the rest of his sentence.