Civil society once again draws attention of the authorities of Kyrgyzstan to the situation in places of detention. Human rights activists — Dinara Oshurakhunova and Klara Sooronkulova — made a statement.
According to them, lawyers and human rights defenders receive information that prisoners with symptoms of COVID-19 and those who have suffered from similar illnesses in recent days are kept in the pretrial detention center 1. However, they are not provided with the necessary medical assistance and the administration of the pre-trial detention center does not take any measures to find out an accurate diagnosis, convincing prisoners that they have a common cold. At the same time, there are up to 15 people and more in each cell.
«Despite assurances from the management of the State Penitentiary Service that they have two laboratories and conduct PCR tests, prisoners report that no tests to detect coronavirus infection in the institution are made. In this regard, we believe that testing for COVID-19 should be carried out with the participation of doctors of the general healthcare system and according to the algorithms of the Ministry of Health of the Kyrgyz Republic. We demand from the Ombudsman Tokon Mamytov and the acting Director of the National Center for Torture Prevention, Dinara Sayakova, a clear and conscientious fulfillment of their mandates in terms of monitoring the observance of prisoners’ rights to receive timely and high-quality medical care and examination,» human rights activists noted.
The statement says that they demand monitoring of places of deprivation of liberty and imprisonment and objective information about the current situation and measures taken to prevent the spread of infection, as well as examination and treatment of patients.
«We also call on the International Red Cross and Red Crescent Societies to pay attention to the situation with prisoners, visit them and give their assessment of the current state of their detention,» the signatories stress.
Note, management of the State Penitentiary Service stated earlier that the inmates of the pretrial detention center 1 will be tested for coronavirus.
