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Kazakhstan’s former economy minister Kuandyk Bishimbayev during the trial in the country’s capital Astana. Picture taken earlier in May.
1 / 2Photo: Alimzhan Barangulov/AP/TT
The brutal assault at the restaurant went on for hours – and was caught on surveillance cameras. Now Kazakhstan’s former economy minister is being sentenced for the murder of his wife.
The case has shed light on the country’s sky-high levels of violence against women.
Kuandyk Bisjimbayev, during 2016 the economy minister of Kazakhstan, was sentenced on Monday to 24 years in prison for the murder in November.
The 44-year-old tortured and murdered his wife Saltanat Nukenova, the Astana court ruled, according to the AFP news agency. According to the prosecutors, she was not only murdered – the 31-year-old is said to have been subjected to systematic, extreme violence by her husband.
400 femicides a year
During the trial, which was broadcast live to millions of Kazakhs, surveillance footage from the restaurant was played. Relatives wept in the courtroom as Bishimbayev appeared to hit his wife in the head, pull her hair and later, when she fell to the floor, kick her body.
The course was protracted: for several hours Bishimbayev walked back and forth in the restaurant, dragged Nukenova between different rooms and brutally beat her, according to Kazakh media.
The murder has sent shock waves across the former Soviet state and led to increased debate about violence in Kazakh homes. According to UN estimates, around 400 women in the country are killed by their partners every year.
“Saltanat Law”
After the murder, tens of thousands signed demands for tougher legislation against violence against women in Kazakhstan, a country where, according to government figures, one in six women say they have been subjected to physical violence by a male partner – while domestic violence often goes unpunished.
The parliament in Astana has been dragging its feet for years regarding a bill to criminalize domestic violence, reports Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.
In April, a law was finally hammered out that toughens the punishment for violence in a close relationship – in Kazakh vernacular called the “Saltanat law”.
FACT Kazakhstan
The former Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan proclaimed an independent state in October 1991. The country has a large Russian population and Russia remains the country’s most important ally.
The Central Asian country is rich in natural resources and oil exports account for approximately 70 percent of export earnings.
The country has a population of nearly 19 million inhabitants. The area covers 2.7 million square kilometers, which is the size of Argentina.
The country’s first president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, ran an authoritarian regime for 29 years with limited space for political opposition and the media.
When he resigned in 2019, the post was taken over by his ally, Kasym-Zjomart Tokajev.
Sources: National Encyclopedia, AFP
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