Kazakh Human Rights Groups demand thorough investigation of mass detentions during election

AKIPRESS.COM - Two leading Kazakh human rights groups have urged the government to thoroughly investigate detentions of hundreds of protesters during and after a June 9 snap presidential poll, the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reports. Kazakhstan's Bureau for Human Rights and Rule of Law and Human Rights Charter Foundation in their joint statement on June 11 protested what they called "mass violations of civil rights and freedoms, namely freedom of expression and freedom of assembly."
Police on June 9 detained hundreds of demonstrators who were calling the election illegitimate, and hundreds more the following day when protesters challenged officially announced preliminary results of the poll giving an overwhelming victory to interim President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, who was handpicked by former authoritarian President Nursultan Nazarbayev to be his successor.
The joint statement by rights groups says police used "unnecessarily excessive violence against protesters" in the capital, Nur-Sultan, the country's largest city, Almaty, and other towns and cities and kept many of them for up to 10 hours without food, water, and contacts with their relatives, which can be defined as "a violent attitude."
The CEC said on June 11 that Tokayev took 70.96 percent of the ballots in the vote. Former journalist Amirzhan Kosanov was a distant second in the balloting with 16.23 percent.