Just minutes after he was released from pre-trial detention on October 8 to be transferred to house arrest, three police officers (possibly from the secret police) arrested 66-year-old Presbyterian pastor Bakhytzhan Kashkumbayev. He is now facing investigation, this time for being an "extremist" or "terrorist", according to his family and lawyer. Police investigator Captain Vyacheslav Glazkov has also denied Kashkumbayev the use of his lawyer. Glazkov, the police Anti-Extremism Department (which is overseeing the case), the KNB secret police and the city prosecutor's office all refused to comment on the case.
Family members told Forum 18 News Service (Danish European Mission is co-founder and involved in the management and operation of Forum 18 News Service) that they have not received any documents about the new accusations of "extremism" nor any details about what is behind them. "All we know is that they watched a video recording, but we don't know who is on it, what it is about or who recorded it," Askar, the pastor's youngest son, told us on October 9. "These new accusations are complete nonsense. They are trying to make my father look like a terrorist."
He added that his mother, Alfiya, "is having a very hard time".
Pastor Kashkumbayev led the Grace Church in Astana until he retired at the age of 66 in October 2012. That same month, a criminal case was opened against him on charges that he had harmed the health of one of his churchgoers. The woman in question is Lyazzat Almenova. She told Forum 18 that her health had not been harmed. Pastor Kashkumbayev was arrested on 17 May 2013. Nine human rights defenders have put Kashkumbayev on a list of Kazakhstan's political prisoners and demanded his release. On October 7, the Astana court ordered Kashkumbayev to be transferred from prison to house arrest.
But in the state's long campaign against Grace Church, officials have alleged that the case also includes espionage, fraud, money laundering, distribution of extremist texts and the use of hallucinogenic drugs in the communion drink. The church and its leaders have repeatedly denied wrongdoing.
Delayed release
The remand prison staff were unable to process the pastor's release on October 7, as the court's decision to transfer him to house arrest was not received until 17:30. His lawyer Nurlan Beisekeyev, his wife Alfiya and other family members arrived at the prison on the morning of October 8. It wasn't until 1pm that all the formalities for his release were completed. Pastor Kashkumbayev was reunited with his wife, whom he had not seen for almost five months since the day he was arrested, family members told Forum 18.
In a video recorded by the family, Pastor Kashkumbayev is seen showing painful varicose veins on his legs to his wife, who then bursts into tears.
New arrest
But three plainclothes officers - sent by Inspector Glazkov - were waiting at the prison gate. They said they were police, but some of the church members recognized one of them as an officer from the KNB secret police, who had previously helped search Grace Church in Astana.
The three men ordered Kashkumbayev to go to the police station so Glazkov could interrogate him "without any clear reason why", lawyer Beisekeyev told Forum 18.
He drove Pastor Kashkumbayev and his wife - along with the three officials - to the police station.
When they were in Glazkov's office, he revealed that new charges had been presented alongside the existing investigation into the pastor. He is now being investigated on charges of violating Article 233-1, Part 1 of the Criminal Code. It covers "propaganda in favor of terrorism or extremism, public incitement to carry out extremist or terrorist acts, as well as the distribution of material with the aforementioned content". The penalty is imprisonment for three to seven years.
In the justification for opening the new case, which lawyer Beisekeyev has read, police investigator Glazkov claims that during the investigation into the alleged "serious injury" Kashkumbayev caused to Almenova's health, an "expert analysis" had shown that there were "extremist elements" in the church's activities.
Deputy Chief of Police of the Astana Police Department for Combating Extremism, Khadzi-Gali Imazhanov, described himself as "chief of the police station" and then threatened the lawyer and Alfiya with violence if they did not leave the police station. Glazkov informed the lawyer that he was only representing Kashkumbayev in the case of Almenova's health, not in the extremism case.
Glazkov refused to listen to Kashkumbayev's protests that he has chosen Beisekeyev as his lawyer and that as a Kazakh citizen he has the right to choose his own lawyer. Beisekeyev insisted to Forum 18 that since the two cases have the same case number, they should be treated as a single case and that there is no reason to prevent him from representing his client.
Deputy Chief of Police Imazhanov then burst into the office shouting and insisting that Beisekeyev had no right to stay and that the police had the right to appoint a lawyer themselves. After physical threats from the two policemen, the lawyer left the office. Alfiya had already left the room after the first round of threats.
Glazkov then tried to get another lawyer who was in the building for another case to represent Kashkumbayev. However, he refused when the pastor declined to use him. He then helped Kashkumbayev write down a statement that he insisted on being represented by his own lawyer. He also advised Kashkumbayev to refuse to answer any questions related to the new case as long as his lawyer was not present.
What are the accusations of extremism?
The lawyer Beisekeyev told Forum 18 that he was not allowed to see a copy of the document initiating the new case. Nor have any of the family members been given access to information about the new case.
Inspector Glazkov repeatedly refused to discuss the new case with Forum 18. He kept repeating "What do you want?" and then hung up the phone. Imangali Makishev, deputy head of the Astana Police Investigation Unit, told Forum 18 on 9 October that the new case against Kashkumbayev is with the Police Anti-Extremism Department. But Yerbulan Kusainov, the head of this department, told Forum 18 the same day that he could not comment over the phone. "These are the rules". Asked why a new case had been opened against the pastor, barely five months after he was first arrested, he replied: "That's for the court to decide". When informed of the family's concerns about the pastor's age and health, and their insistence on his innocence, Kusainov replied: "My conscience is clear".
It was also not possible to get a comment from either Kusainov's second-in-command, Imhashanov, or Astana's public prosecutor, Muktar Zhorgenbayev.
Church members told Forum 18 that the new extremism case against Kashkumbayev is under the supervision of the state prosecutor.
Health problems
Under Kazakh law, a person can be detained for three days after arrest, after which a court must either extend the detention or release him. Astana City Court No. 2 in Almaty - which authorized Kashkumbayev's detention for five months - told Forum 18 that it has not received any request to keep him in prison.
Askar Kashkumbayev said that he and his family are very concerned about the pastor's health condition. "We had hoped that he would have been able to receive treatment for his varicose veins while under house arrest," he told Forum 18. "He is in great pain and yesterday they made him stand in the corridor for two hours in prison."
Since his re-arrest, Kashkumbayev has been held in the Astana police temporary isolation prison. This was confirmed by the head of the prison, Adilbek (he declined to give his last name) on October 9. When informed that the family was concerned about his health and that the court's decision to transfer him to house arrest was partly based on the pastor's health, he dismissed the concerns. "His health is normal. He is being examined by a paramedic. No one is dying here in my prison."
Protests
Askar Kashkumbayev told Forum 18 that the family has sent written complaints to many public authorities about the treatment of his father, including the city prosecutor's office and the district court. He said he also plans to send a complaint to Kazakhstan's Human Rights Ombudsman, Askar Shakirov.
(According to the International Coordinating Committee of National Institutions for the Promotion and Protection of Human Rights, Kazakhstan's human rights ombudsman does not fully meet the standards set out in the Paris Principles on the separation of such human rights organizations from the state.)
Askar Kashkumbayev said that after his father's arrest in May, the local branch of the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in Astana had unfortunately told him that they could not help, as they are not able to intervene in cases of individuals.
