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P 281036Z JAN 09 ZDK
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RUEHAST/USOFFICE ALMATY 1136

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 ASTANA 000165 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR INL/AAE, G/TIP, SCA/CEN (O'MARA) 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV SOCI KCRM RU UZ KZ
SUBJECT:  KAZAKHSTAN:  MEDIA REPORTS ON HUMAN TRAFFICKING CASES FOR 
THE SECOND HALF OF 2008 
 
ASTANA 00000165  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
¶1.  SUMMARY:  The following is a summary of local media reports on 
human trafficking cases in Kazakhstan from July to December 2008. 
END SUMMARY. 
 
LABOR EXPLOITATION 
 
¶2.  December 2, Kazakhstanskaya Pravda:  In October, an oblast-level 
court in Karaganda increased a lower court's sentence from a 
one-year, suspended sentence to 10 years in prison.  The defendant 
was convicted of kidnapping a resident of Abai in 2000 and, for 
almost eight years, forcing him to work on a farm and tend cattle. 
The victim escaped and reported his imprisonment to police.  During 
the course of the investigation, the victim received assistance from 
the police as part of the national program on the protection of 
participants in criminal trials.  The defendant's two brothers 
threatened the victim. The police provided him with an apartment 
during the investigation. 
 
¶3.  November 13, Interfax:  Police officers in Kulsary, Atyrau 
oblast in western Kazakhstan, freed a family of Uzbek migrant 
workers held on a farm for one and a half years.  The workers were 
sold to a local farmer for approximately $80.  After two members of 
the family, the 47-year-old father and a 10-year-old son, escaped, 
police found them at a railway station.  The family reported that 
they had been beaten and that a 16-year-old son was still being held 
on the farm.  A criminal case has been opened against the farmer. 
 
¶4.  August 27, Liter:  A judge in Karaganda dismissed a labor 
exploitation case after the 36-year victim and his captors 
"reconciled their differences."  The victim was reportedly chained 
in a backyard, severely beaten, fed bread once a day, and forced to 
work chopping wood for an outdoor cafe.  The court did not question 
the reconciliation, despite the fact that the victim still bears the 
scars of the beatings he received at the hands of the two 
defendants.  Though the police expressed frustration with the 
dismissal, the court was unable to proceed without the testimony of 
the victim. 
 
¶5.  August 16, Express-K:  An operation conducted in the South 
Kazakhstan oblast targeting businesses employing teenagers in 
physically difficult or harmful conditions resulted in the filing of 
criminal cases against the owners of bakeries, cafes, and gas 
stations.  Prosecutors reported that the worst conditions were in 
car washes, where minors worked up to 10 hours in water during cold 
weather for very low salaries.  In bakeries, teenagers worked in a 
variety of jobs while breathing in natural gas used to heat clay 
ovens.  Inspectors found that all the teenagers working in the 
bakeries were from Uzbekistan. 
 
SEXUAL EXPLOITATION 
 
¶6.  November 17, Liter and Interfax:  Eight women from Uzbekistan 
forced to work as prostitutes were released from a brothel in 
Zhibek-Zholy, South Kazakhstan oblast.  The brothel in which the 
women were held was discovered during an inspection by prosecutors 
and police during a joint operation.  The women are being housed by 
the police until they testify at trial. 
 
¶7.  September 26, Karavan:  In Karaganda, a woman was arrested for a 
second time for forcing young girls (the ages were not reported) 
into prostitution.  After her first conviction, she received a 
two-year suspended sentence, after which she continued doing 
business.  She recruited girls at the railway station, offering 
housing and employment.  When girls arrived at the brothel, their 
passports were taken away for "registration."  At the time of the 
woman's arrest, police found three girls in her brothel.  Each girl 
had been working in the brothel, on average, for a month and a half 
and reported receiving 10 of the $70 paid by customers. 
 
¶8.  August 25, Megapolis:  A 19-year-old from Petropavlovsk in North 
Kazakhstan oblast offered two under-aged girls jobs as waitresses 
and baby sitters and brought them to an apartment where she lived 
with her boyfriend.  The couple then forced the girls to work as 
prostitutes.  In June 2008, the woman was arrested after receiving 
$50 from a client at a sauna where she delivered one of the girls. 
She had been in business since March 2007.  Criminal charges were 
filed against the woman for pimping and trafficking in minors; the 
boyfriend disappeared and is being sought by police. 
 
ASTANA 00000165  002.4 OF 003 
 
 
 
¶9.  August 13, Interfax, Megapolis, Vremya, Express-K:  Police in 
Almaty arrested two women on suspicion of pimping and organizing a 
brothel.  According to police, a 23-year-old resident of 
Ust-Kamenogorsk, the administrative centre of East Kazakhstan 
oblast, called police to report that she and six other girls were 
being held in an apartment and being forced to work as prostitutes. 
During the search, police discovered a cellar where the girls were 
kept for a year.  One of the freed girls said that she had been 
promised a job as a waitress for $500 a month.  Other girls told 
similar stories.  Only three agreed to file criminal charges.  The 
madam insisted that she was only the cook and did not know why the 
girls were kept in the cellar.  Police detained the actual cook, who 
had worked in the brothel for five years feeding the girls once a 
day. 
 
¶10. August 13, Liter:  Police arrested members of a 
Kazakhstani-Uzbek criminal group that trafficked 15 women, including 
one minor, from Uzbekistan to Kazakhstan for purposes of sexual 
exploitation.  The victims were held in an apartment in Almaty after 
being offered jobs as waitresses.  Police arrested a 23-year-old 
woman from Uzbekistan, who was a cashier, and two Kazakhstani pimps. 
 Police are still searching for a Kazakhstani woman who worked as a 
recruiter. 
 
¶11.  August 7, Interfax, Express-K:  Brothels in which twenty-three 
women and three minors from Uzbekistan had been working were closed 
by police in Almaty.  The brothels were owned by a 29-year-old woman 
from South Kazakhstan oblast who was under surveillance for 
approximately one month until police found the two one-room 
apartments used as brothels.  Thirteen women from Uzbekistan were 
found in each apartment and none had identification documents.  The 
madam started doing business in 2006 and recruited only women from 
Uzbekistan.  A criminal case was initiated. 
 
¶12.  August 6, BBC Monitoring Central Asia:  On March 26, police in 
Uzbekistan arrested a criminal group trafficking women from 
Uzbekistan to Kazakhstan.  The head of the group worked with two 
accomplices to drug five women and sell them to two Kazakhstanis for 
$250 each.  Once in Kazakhstan, the women were forced to work as 
prostitutes.  An investigation is on-going. 
 
¶13.  July 4, Karavan:  Police in Almaty discovered an injured 
16-year-old girl on the sidewalk outside of an apartment building. 
She reported that she had been held against her will, forced to work 
as a prostitute, and tortured for several months.  The girl had come 
to Almaty from a small village in East Kazakhstan oblast looking for 
work.  Her mother had died three years earlier and she had no other 
family.  She took a job in a small, local canteen but was soon 
fired.  A fellow villager promised her a good job in Almaty and 
brought her to stay with friends, a married couple with a 
three-year-old child.  The girl was then informed that she had been 
purchased for $500.  She was forced to work as a prostitute, 
receiving seven clients a day for $100 each.  She was also made to 
clean the house, do laundry, cook, and care for the child.  One 
night when she failed to hear the child cry, the mother poured 
boiling water on the girl's back, resulting in third-degree burns. 
When the girl tried to escape, she was shown video of a previous 
girl's fingers being chopped off for trying to escape.  The girl 
jumped from the fifth floor and broke her back.  A criminal case was 
opened and an investigation was conducted haphazardly.  The girl was 
later moved out of Almaty by an NGO and police closed the 
investigation for insufficient evidence. 
 
CHILD PORNOGRAPHY 
 
¶14.  November 12, Interfax:  A Kazakhstani woman, arrested on theft 
charges in Rudnyi, was discovered to be subject of a Russian warrant 
for using her children to produce pornographic films.  In 1998, the 
woman, her boyfriend, and two children went to Moscow for work, 
where she gave birth to three more children.  Russian police 
uncovered evidence that she, her boyfriend, and other friends 
produced pornographic films with her five children, ranging in age 
from two to ten.  The woman is currently in a Kazakhstani jail and 
police are searching for her boyfriend.  (NOTE:  Because this is an 
ongoing case, the police are unable to release information to Post. 
Press reports include no information on whether or when the woman 
will be extradited to Russia.  END NOTE.) 
 
ASTANA 00000165  003.4 OF 003 
 
 
 
HOAGLAND