I waited for some big-wig Western media to publish something on the Eurasian Media Forum, which after three days finished on April 21. In the old tradition of the six-year-old “media initiative”, this year’s event featured high-profile speakers and hosted controversial discussions. However, relatively little of substance came through to the outside apart from one superb radio feature on Deutschlandradio and the Media Forum’s website.

Where were the journalists? Ayan Sharipbaev of Svoboda Slova thinks (my translation):

“This is no forum of journalists, but for journalists. They are supposed to come here, look at things and leave as quickly as possible. One could speak about those journalists that died here not too long ago, about those that were silenced - why this happens and how this can be.”

Asked why the forum deals more with international issues rather than with local problems, the director of the Forum Vladimir Reyrikh replies:

“It is very difficult to find people that speak about journalism professionally. Especially journalists can’t do that. Because they are too much tied into their job. In politics, the whole spectrum of political and cultural scientists and philosophers is united. Their reflexes are better. Journalists are simply too busy with their own things. And about the problem that our media does not always write freely about politics: This is due to the fact that media and politics is one and same thing. Unfortunately.”

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Cross-posted on Global Voices

Kazis Toguzbayev is a Kazakhstani journalist/blogger, who was sued for insulting the honor and the dignity of the president in January 2007 when he uploaded two articles on a group blog KUB.kz. Kazis is 59, married and has grandchildren. He is a colonel of the Ministry of Defense of Kazakhstan in reserve and a pensioner for 10 years now. We spoke about the lessons that he learned after the trial and about the citizen journalism in Kazakhstan.

Q: What is blog and citizen journalism for you?
A: It’s a possibility of free self-realization.

Q: Why did you decide to write the articles, which, as you might have known, will get you in trouble?
A: In this case not my mind, but my feelings lead me. I would not have been able to exist if I did not write and upload these articles. Not writing them would be worse than being punished for it. In other words, I could not have been silent.

Q: What topics are you most interested in, how do you choose what to write about?
A: I quite like philosophical topics, like the religions and issues of ethnicity. Unfortunately, the Kazakhstani publications do not yet accept the conceptual and reasonable discussion on these topics. In my case I could say that my topics have chosen me. Because I have soul as well, and it cannot accept and not answer to what is going on. I personally felt that when Altynbek Sarsenbayev (Kazakhstani opposition politician) was murdered and when the authorities tried to hide the truth about his murder, I was being murdered too. I felt like I was being killed too – though I am alive, I felt like I was being buried alive.

Q: Do you think your case has helped to attract the attention to the freedom of speech in Kazakhstan? (more…)