Despite arrests and administrative fines, supporters of Zhovtis keep demonstrating their discontent with the Kazakh government’s investigation and trial of the famous human rights activist, Norwegian Helsinki Committee reports.

On Wednesday 30 September, journalist Janna Baitelova, activist Olga Urasbekova and student Rinat Kibraev joined the latest protest on the square downtown capital Almaty. The next day they were summoned to the regional department of the internal affairs.

On Wednesday 23 September, another protest in support of imprisoned human rights activist Evgeniy Zhovtis took place on the same square. This time the protest was initiated by the editor of “Zhas Alash” Ryspek Sarsenbaiuly (brother of one of the country’s opposition leaders – Sarsenbayev, who was killed in Almaty in February 2008, by the intelligence services) and an independent journalist Sergei Duvanov.

During the protest Sarsenbayev and Duvanov talked to the press, and walked to the end of the avenue holding posters reading “Today Zhovtis – tomorrow – you” in Kazakh and Russian, accompanied by shouts of “Shame to unjust court” and “Freedom to Zhovtis”.

Sergei Duvanov and Rysbek Sarsenbayev were able to not only express their opinions, but also they easily carried out a march along the avenue, something which is usually stopped by the police.

But on Monday 28 September, both protesters were provided with protocols of charges in accordance with the article 373 of the Code of Administrative Offence of Kazakhstan. The same evening they received the summons to court.

On Tuesday 29 September, Sergey Duvanov was fined by the judge to 19,440 tenge (equivalent to $130). The court trial for Sarsenbayev was postponed for one week due to a mistake that occurred in the protocol.

Earlier, two “one-man” protests on the same square initiated by political analyst Victor Kovtunovskiy and the editor of the Bureau of Human Rights Andrey Sviridov respectively didn’t gather so many policemen in comparison to the latest protest where the police showed up twice in numbers. Nevertheless, the prosecutor who turned up during the protest read out the traditional warning of the “illegality” of the action, then withdrew without engaging in the debate.

The supporters of Zhovtis have no intentions to stop the Wednesday protests that have become almost traditional. On the contrary, they will continue holding them until Zhovtis is freed.

Yevgeni Zhovtis, director of the Kazakhstan International Bureau for Human Rights and Rule of Law (KIBHR), was convicted for vehicular manslaughter on September 4th 2009. He was sentenced to four years of imprisonment. Yevgeni Zhovtis was involved in a fatal car accident on July 26th 2009, where a pedestrian was killed.

Zhovtis was chair of Soros Foundation Kazakhstan from 1999 to 2002; he is the recipient of many international awards for his work.

Zhovtis – who acknowledges that his car hit and killed a man on a dark road, but who insists he was not criminally responsible – has reportedly argued that his rights were violated during the trial. Motions brought by the defense were routinely denied, and the judge’s verdict took as long to read as he had allegedly spent writing it – 15 minutes – prompting suggestions that the decision had been prepared in advance, EurasiaNet.org reported.