Four convicted in shooting, stabbing of Kazakh journalist

New York, July 11, 2013-A court in western Kazakhstan has sentenced four men to terms ranging from 11 to 15 years for carrying out the brutal attack on Kazakh journalist Lukpan Akhmedyarov in April 2012, according to news reports. The Committee to Protect Journalists welcomes this conviction, but calls on Kazakh authorities to identify the masterminds behind the attack and bring them to justice.

"Authorities deserve credit for bringing the assailants to justice, but their work is not done," said Muzaffar Suleymanov, CPJ's Europe and Central Asia researcher. "The people who plotted this vicious assault must be apprehended and prosecuted."

A regional court in Uralsk on Wednesday convicted Askhat Takhambetov, Mursalim Sultangereyev, Almaz Batyrkhairov, and Manarbek Akbulatov of the attempted murder ofAkhmedyarov, local and international press reports said. News accounts did not immediately report background information on the defendants. The court also ordered the defendants to pay a total of 4 million Kazakh tenge (about US$26,000) in moral damages to the journalist.

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