Marina Kozlova

New York, January 15, 2010—The Committee to Protect Journalists called on Uzbek authorities today to immediately cease their campaign of intimidation against the handful of independent journalists remaining in the Central Asian country. 

Dear Mr. Ganiev:

The Committee to Protect Journalists is greatly dismayed by your ministry's repeated and unfair denial of press accreditation to Marina Kozlova, Tashkent correspondent for United Press International (UPI).

Kozlova has worked as a journalist in Uzbekistan for 10 years and was officially accredited by the Foreign Ministry from 1998 to 2003, first as a correspondent for the Russian weekly Obshchaya Gazeta and since 1999 as a correspondent for UPI. Kozlova has faced repeated harassment in retaliation for her reporting on the mistreatment of journalists, human rights abuses by police, and torture in Uzbek prisons.

APRIL 27, 2005
Posted: May 17, 2005

Marina Kozlova, United Press International
LEGAL ACTION

The Foreign Ministry denied press accreditation to Marina Kozlova, Tashkent correspondent for United Press International (UPI).

Torture of political and religious dissidents remains commonplace under the brutal regime of President Islam Karimov. In February, writer Emin Usman died in detention, and the July death of imprisoned human rights activist Shovriq Rusimorodov confirmed the deteriorating political situation. Karimov has also cracked down on civil liberties by jailing thousands of Muslims under the pretext of fighting Islamic terrorism and fundamentalism.