Uzbek opposition activist given suspended sentence

Reuters May 23 An Uzbek court freed on Tuesday a prominent opposition activist who had been sentenced to 10 years in jail, ordering that she serve a seven year suspended sentence as she has two young children. Nodira Khidayatova, a leading member of the moderate opposition Sunshine Uzbekistan Coalition, was arrested last December after returning from a trip to Moscow where she held a news conference criticising President Islam Karimov. Her supporters said her conviction in March on embezzlement and tax evasion charges was politically motivated and part of curbs on dissent in the authoritarian Central Asian state since a bloody government crackdown in the town of Andizhan. In its ruling, the Tashkent city court upheld her conviction but said she should serve a seven year suspended sentence to enable her to care for her children, a court source said. She had also already paid $100,000 of the $230,000 back taxes that companies controlled by her were judged to have evaded in the first ruling, the source said. The Sunshine Coalition came to prominence following an uprising in Andizhan a year ago when it criticised Karimov's government for excessive use of force. Witnesses said hundreds of unarmed men, women and children were shot by troops in the Ferghana Valley town. The government says 187 people -- either Islamist extremists or police -- were killed. Sanjar Umarov, a cotton and oil businessman who chairs the Sunshine Coalition, was sentenced in March to 11 years in prison for economic crimes. The term was cut on appeal to eight years. Western countries have expressed concern about the jailing of opposition and human rights activists following Andizhan. They also point to increased pressure on foreign-funded charities and the few independent media. Russia and China have backed Karimov.