UNHCR hopeful over the fate of Andijan four

The office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) remains upbeat over the fate of four UNHCR-mandated refugees from the eastern Uzbek city of Andijan currently being held in custody in Kyrgyzstan and denied refugee status. Tashkent wants their deportation for involvement in the Andijan uprising in May 2005.

"Two of the four have heard yesterday that they are not recognised as refugees. This was an appeal against the first instance court decision and has now been finite. [But] they still have a chance to go to the Supreme Court. So, we are waiting for a Supreme Court decision," Astrid van Genderen Stort, a UNHCR spokeswoman, said from Geneva on Friday.

"The first two of the four were not recognised as refugees by the Supreme Court. We've spoken to the Kyrgyz authorities, so far we believe that there will be no deportation of these people. We are continuing to stress this with the Kyrgyz authorities," van Genderen Stort maintained.

"We have appealed to the Kyrgyz authorities not to deport these people and for the time being we are hopeful," she maintained.

Her comments came one day after a Kyrgyz court decision to deny the two Andijan Uzbeks refugee status, as initially requested by the Kyrgyz migration service.

More than 500 Uzbeks fled across the border to Kyrgyzstan in May 2005, following a violent crackdown on anti-government protests in Andijan, in which upwards of 1,000 unarmed civilians may have been killed, according to rights groups. The Uzbek government said that the death toll was 187.

In late July, 439 Andijan refugees in Kyrgyzstan were airlifted to Romania, a temporary stop before third country resettlement by the office of UNHCR. Of the 15 Uzbeks left in custody in southern Kyrgyzstan, 11 were later moved to London, while the fate of the remaining four remained unclear. Tashkent wants their deportation, accusing them of killing some government officials in the Andijan uprising.

According to UNHCR, several Uzbeks from Andijan were deported from Kyrgyzstan in May 2005. Most recently, around 10 Uzbeks were deported to Uzbekistan from Ukraine in February.

"Unfortunately, there are a lot of examples [of deportation of Uzbeks]," van Genderen Stort conceded. "They [the Kyrgyz authorities] have assured us that at this point in time a political decision is going to be taken on the fate of these people," she noted.

As for the office of Kyrgyzstan's prosecutor-general - the body mandated to make a legal decision on the fate of the four - an official said that no ruling had been made on the issue yet.

"We haven't made any decision on their fate yet. Before the case [of the second two] is addressed by the Supreme Court, there is a criminal case involving them that needs to be looked into. Therefore, we will be considering this case when it has gone through all the procedures and steps," Sumar Nasiza, chief of office for Kyrgyzstan's prosecutor general, said.