CCPR/C/116/D/2044/2011
1.
The authors of the communication are T.V. and A.G., both Uzbek nationals born in
1955 and 1968, respectively. They claim to be victims of a violation by Uzbekistan of their
rights under article 2 (3); article 7; article 9 (1), (3) and (4); article 14 (1) and article 19 (1)
and (2) of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. The Optional Protocol
entered into force for the State party on 28 December 1995.
The facts as presented by the authors
2.1
The authors are spouses and are living in the Sat-Tepo building quarter in
Samarkand. On 3 October 2006, the President of the Quarter’s Committee and the Chair of
the Khafiz Sherozi mahalla (urban division) broke into the basement of the building and
installed a common water consumption measuring device, without consulting with the
individual owners. The owners, including the authors, disagreed with that measure, since, in
the building, there were three commercial enterprises — a bakery, a grocery shop and a
hairdresser’s salon — which consumed much more water than the owners of residential
apartments. On 7 October 2006, a meeting of all apartment owners in the building took
place. During the meeting, the first author criticized the actions of Sh. The latter, who was
visibly drunk, got angry and started insulting her and threatened to lock her in a psychiatric
hospital. The second author defended his wife. Subsequently, the owners wrote a common
complaint against the actions of Sh. and elected the first author as their representative.
2.2
On 10 October 2006, at around 10.30 a.m., two individuals in civilian clothing came
to the authors’ apartment, stated that they were police officials and invited them to come to
the local police station, claiming that the inspector responsible for the crime prevention in
the area, Mr. N., wanted to speak with them. The authors voluntarily went to the police
station with the two men. In the yard of the station, they saw an ambulance, but did not pay
much attention to it. When they entered N.’s office, they saw that the latter was having a
discussion with Sh. Almost immediately, several individuals in white coats apprehended the
authors and, without presenting any official documents or a decision by a prosecutor or
court, requested that they should sit in the ambulance. When the authors protested and
resisted, N., Sh. and several police officers intervened, threw the second author to the floor,
kicked him, put on handcuffs and gagged him so he could not call for help. The second
author was then dragged to the ambulance and thrown to the floor. The first author tried to
call relatives, but N. took her telephone and broke it, took the cane that she used for
walking, and finally she too was forced to enter the ambulance. The men in white coats sat
on top of the authors and the ambulance drove away in an unknown direction.
2.3
When the ambulance stopped, the authors realized that they had been taken to the
city’s psychiatric hospital. The authors were separated. The second author was forced to
sleep on a bare net and was detained in a room with a patient who kept waiving a razor
blade at him. The first author was detained in a common room with persons with mental
impairments. She suffers from Bechterew’s disease and severe arthritis, but was denied
access to the numerous medications that she needs for her condition and the opportunity to
walk, which also aggravated her condition.
2.4
Three days later, when the personnel were not paying close attention, the second
author managed to call his relatives, who immediately alerted others. The authors’ son-inlaw, a doctor, spoke with the head of the psychiatric hospital, and the authors were released
on 19 October 2006. The authors later found out in the context of civil court proceedings
that, on 14 October 2006, the Chief Medical Doctor of the psychiatric hospital had issued
an order to create a psychiatric evaluation commission in order to evaluate the authors’
mental health. According to the order, the decision had been made because the authors had
complained on numerous occasions to different institutions since 2002. The conclusion was
that the first author had, inter alia, a borderline mental condition that made her want to
complain and that the second author suffered from post-traumatic encephalopathy
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