In the wake of yet another horrific murder of a young woman by a man, Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov launched a campaign to reinstate the death penalty for the most heinous crimes against women and children.
Kyrgyzstan abolished capital punishment in 2007. Activists warn that bringing it back won’t effectively address the risks of violence faced by women and girls, or the societal and legal challenges they face in achieving justice.
“While it is essential to combat violence against women, the death penalty is not the solution,” a group of international human rights organization wrote in a statement condemning Japarov’s efforts.
“Global evidence shows that harsher punishments, including executions, do not act as effective deterrents. Instead, reinstating capital punishment risks further abuse in a legal system already plagued by corruption, impunity, and weak rule of law,” the statement, signed by Freedom for Eurasia, the International Partnership for Human Rights (IPHR), The Norwegian Helsinki Committee, Araminta, International Federation for Human Rights (FIDH), People in Need (PIN) and Civil Rights Defenders, continues.
In late September, 17-year-old Aisuluu Mukasheva left her family’s home in Karakol. She never returned. Kyrgyzstan’s Ministry of Internal Affairs alleges that 41-year-old Kumarbek Abdyrov abducted, raped, and murdered Mukasheva. On October 15, in an ElTR television channel report, Ministry of Internal Affairs officials claimed that Abdyrov had confessed to a series of other murders, including the killing of a pregnant woman in 2011, and two women in Bishkek in 2014.
According to media reports, in 2016, Abdyrov had been sentenced to 12 years in prison on an attempted murder charge stemming from a 2015 incident involving a young woman. His sentence was apparently reduced to seven years and then in 2018 he was released on parole. He served just two years for attempting to murder a young woman.
The story is horrific and all too common.
In 2018, coincidentally the year Abdyrov was released on parole, Burulai Turdaaly Kyzy was stabbed to death inside a police station by a man who had twice kidnapped her. The case triggered a massive public outcry, but young women in Kyrgyzstan continue to be abused and murdered.
“Media reports from Kyrgyzstan show that the authorities have consistently failed to address the root causes of [gender-based violence] — police often fail to register victims’ complaints, do not pursue immediate probe into sexual abuse accusations, and the abusers face leniency from the judicial authorities,” noted the cadre of human rights organizations in their statement opposing the reinstatement of the death penalty.
“The unbearable pain of Aisuluu’s family must not be instrumentalized for political gain. Their tragedy reflects the systemic failures that continue to put women and girls at risk.”
In a 2023 interview with The Diplomat in the wake of the torture of Asel Nogoibaeva in Kyrgyzstan and the murder of Saltanat Nukenov in Kazakhstan, gender and human rights research Svetlana Dzardanova noted that Kyrgyzstan has a solid legal framework and the institutional infrastructure to fight gender-based violence. “But having good laws is not enough and even these require further improvements to account for existing gaps allowing the perpetrators to avoid punishment.”
“Social stigma, fear of reprisal, lack of awareness, and insufficient support systems make it difficult for women to file complaints and pursue justice. Many complaints never reach a court and those that do have high chances of ending in administrative or no punishment at all. The atmosphere of impunity contributes to perpetrators’ aggravated behavior,” Dzardanova explained in 2023.
Two years later, activists are still making much the same pleas.
“… the government must acknowledge and address the systemic problems that continue to put women and girls at risk,” the group of human rights organizations concluded in their statement. “In Aisuluu [Mukasheva]’s case, her relatives reported that police were initially reluctant to take action and only began the search under pressure, with family members themselves identifying the suspect’s car. This is not an isolated incident — repeated failures by law enforcement to respond promptly and professionally have allowed violence against women to escalate with fatal consequences across the country.”
Killing Abdyrov – or any other perpetrator – won’t bring the victims back to life.