VZCZCXRO4213
RR RUEHLN RUEHPOD RUEHVK RUEHYG
DE RUEHMO #3736/01 3590614
ZNR UUUUU ZZH
R 240614Z DEC 08
FM AMEMBASSY MOSCOW
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 1344
INFO RUEHXD/MOSCOW POLITICAL COLLECTIVE
RUEHSR/AMCONSUL STRASBOURG

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 02 MOSCOW 003736 
 
DEPARTMENT FOR PRM/ECA AND EUR/RUS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
E.O.  12958: N/A 
TAGS: PREF PHUM PREL SMIG OEXC RS
SUBJECT: FREE AT LAST?  IVANOVO UZBEKS WIN AT ECHR 
 
MOSCOW 00003736  001.2 OF 002 
 
 
¶1. (U) Summary:  Since their June 2005 arrest in connection with 
violent unrest in Andijan, 13 ethnic Uzbeks have been in limbo, 
caught between the threat of refoulement to Uzbekistan and an offer 
of refugee status in Sweden.  In a decision announced December 15, 
the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) cited the risk of ill 
treatment in Uzbekistan in ruling against Russia, which had sought 
to extradite the 13 to stand trial in their homeland.  The ECHR 
judgment awarded 15,000 euros to each in little more than symbolic 
recognition of more than three years of confinement, ostracism, and 
penury in the Russian provincial city of Ivanovo.  Whether Russia 
will comply with the Court's judgment remains an open question.  End 
Summary. 
 
¶2. (U) Refcoord visited Ivanovo, a city of 400,000 some 300 
kilometers northeast of Moscow, December 16-17 to promote NGO 
referrals to the U.S. Refugee Admissions Program.  Refcoord's host, 
lawyer Svetlana Martynova, a participant in the March 2008 
International Visitor Leadership Program "Strengthening Legal 
Protection and Efficiency in Migration Policy," arranged a meeting 
with three ethnic Uzbek refugees.  These were among the applicants 
in the case of Ismoilov and Others v. Russia that originated before 
the ECHR in 2006 to prevent the men's refoulement. 
 
Ivanovo Uzbeks Fight Refoulement 
-------------------------------- 
 
¶3. (U) The individuals, including Ilhomjon Ismoilov, who came to be 
known as the "Ivanovo Uzbeks" arrived in Russia at various dates 
between 2000 and the beginning of 2005.  After the unrest in Andijan 
in May 2005, they were arrested in Russia at the request of Uzbek 
authorities, who suspected them of financing insurgents.  Although 
the applicants denied any involvement in the Andijan events, and an 
inquiry conducted by Russian authorities seemed to corroborate their 
statements, Russia commenced extradition proceedings against them. 
The "Ismoilov" applicants claimed that their extradition to 
Uzbekistan would expose them to danger of ill treatment.  They also 
lodged applications for asylum, reiterating their fears of torture 
and persecution for political motives.  They supported their 
submissions with reports prepared by UN institutions and 
international NGOs describing the ill treatment of detainees in 
Uzbekistan.  The Russian authorities rejected their applications for 
refugee status and ordered their extradition to Uzbekistan. 
 
¶4. (U) The ECHR ultimately found that the Ivanovo Uzbeks had fled 
persecution on account of their religious beliefs and successful 
businesses.  Some of them had earlier experienced ill-treatment at 
the hands of the Uzbek authorities, and others had seen their 
relatives or business partners arrested and charged with 
participation in illegal extremist organizations.  In its decision 
on the applicants' appeal to the ECHR, the Court took note of 
UNHCR's grant to them of mandate refugee status.  The April 2008 
judgment concludes: 
 
"The Court is well aware of the immense difficulties faced by States 
in modern times in protecting their communities from terrorist 
violence. However, even in these circumstances, the Convention 
prohibits in absolute terms torture or inhuman or degrading 
treatment or punishment, irrespective of the victim's conduct. . . 
.In these circumstances, the activities of the individual in 
question, however undesirable or dangerous, cannot be a material 
consideration." 
 
On December 19 the applicants learned that this judgment in their 
favor had become final upon the Court's rejection four days earlier 
of the Russian Federation's request for referral to the Grand 
Chamber. 
 
Lives on Hold 
------------- 
 
¶5. (U) The Ivanovo Uzbeks spent nearly two years in detention 
following their initial arrest, a "deprivation of liberty. . . not 
circumscribed by adequate safeguards against arbitrariness," 
according to the ECHR.  They won release in March 2007 but continued 
to reside in Ivanovo, as Russia refused to grant them exit 
permission to move to Sweden, which based on UNHCR referrals had 
offered them refugee status.  Four of them were joined by their 
families, but the others could not afford to move their relatives to 
Russia.  Together the 13 settled in to a hardscrabble existence, 
surviving on meager UN assistance and odd black market jobs while 
their case worked its way through the Council of Europe's human 
rights machinery. 
 
¶6. (U) In the 1990's and early 2000's the men had run businesses 
that sold fabric, towels, work clothes and furniture.  (Note: 
Historically, Ivanovo was the capital of Russia's textile industry, 
importing cotton from Uzbekistan; however, its economy has gone into 
steep decline, succumbing to competition from Asia since the 
break-up of the Soviet Union.  End Note.)  The notoriety of their 
arrest and imprisonment, along with government seizure of their 
 
MOSCOW 00003736  002.2 OF 002 
 
 
assets, effectively ended their careers as entrepreneurs. 
Occasionally they could pick up work as laborers at construction 
sites, but for the most part they survived on rental subsidies and 
the dollar a day for food that UNHCR could afford to grant them.  It 
was difficult to find apartments they could afford and landlords who 
would accept them, particularly as their faces were familiar to many 
in the city from television news stories about "terrorists." 
 
One Country's Terrorist, Another's Refugee 
------------------------------------------ 
 
¶7. (U) Refcoord visited one of the men, 47-year-old Mahmud 
Rustamhodjaev, at his home in a rundown apartment block on the 
outskirts of Ivanovo.  Rustamhodjaev moved to Ivanovo from Andijan 
in 2001.  He used to return to Uzbekistan to visit his family, most 
recently in March 2005.  He is married with three daughters - the 
youngest born while he was incarcerated - and a son born after his 
release.  After his release from Russian prison, his wife and 
children came to join him.  The family rents a spare but pleasant 
and well-heated two-bedroom apartment.  The fifth-floor walk-up 
costs 12,000 rubles (about U.S. $480) a month, of which UNHCR covers 
7,000. 
 
¶8. (U) Life for Rustamhodjaev's family is lived in a narrow frame, 
constricted by both poverty and uncertainty about the future.  His 
wife rarely leaves the apartment because she does not speak Russian. 
 The temporary registration she received when she first arrived in 
March 2007 was only for three months, and in order to renew it she 
would need to leave Russia and return, something the family cannot 
afford.  Without valid documents, she is vulnerable on the street to 
arrest and deportation.  Mahmud, fluent in Russian, works illegally 
as a night watchman and occasional truck driver, and he does the 
family's shopping. 
 
¶9. (U) The couple's nine-year-old daughter is going to school in 
Russia for the first time this year.  Earlier the school would not 
accept her because she could not speak Russian.  Rustamhodjaev had 
to pay a tutor 150 rubles (about U.S. $6) an hour for the girl's 
first year in Russia in order to bring her to a level where the 
school would accept her.  Fortunately the tutor also helped the girl 
to keep up with her academic subjects, so she started school at 
grade level.  To pay for the tutoring and all the other expenses not 
covered by his meager UNHCR stipend, Rustamhodjaev borrowed money 
from his mother in Uzbekistan and brother and sister living in 
Russia.  He is 60,000 rubles (about U.S. $2,400) in debt, money he 
hopes to pay back if he ever receives the 15,000 euros that the ECHR 
says Russia must pay him. 
 
¶10. (U) Restitution hopefully will come soon.  The neighbors have 
been saying they do not like the noise made by Rustamhodjaev's 
children, and he may need to find new shelter.  Neighbors' nuisance 
complaints are sometimes racism in disguise, but Mahmud says he 
would rather live even with Russian xenophobia than face return to 
Uzbekistan.  And while there were only about 20 Uzbeks in Ivanovo 
when he first immigrated, now there are several thousand, as well as 
an ethnic community association called Zemlyachestvo Uzbekov. 
Mainly, Rustamhodjaev said, he wants to live peacefully and work 
legally, with an end to all the litigation and uncertainty. 
 
No Closure as Yet 
----------------- 
 
¶11. (U) The ECHR's December decision concluded the Ivanovo Uzbeks' 
litigation, but uncertainty remains.  Irina Sokolova, counsel for 
the 13, is not predicting whether the Russian Government will pay 
the ordered restitution and permit the men's departure to Sweden. 
She told us December 23 that she plans to meet with officials after 
the New Year's holiday to discuss execution of the Court's 
judgment. 
 
Comment 
------- 
 
¶12. (U) The Ivanovo Uzbeks (and their legal battle for recognition 
and protection) are uncommonly renowned, but their life on the 
margins of Russian economic and social life is typical of refugees 
here.  Septel will report on Afghan refugees in Ivanovo. 
 
RUBIN