Tag Archives: forced labor

…There [in Koson Prison] I was met by officers and military wardens at the head of captain Boboev. The moment I entered within doors they began to bludgeon and beat. They had beaten me one after another. Beating at the same time captain Boboev gave a “talk” to me. They brought one convict who by order of the heads raped those newly arrived convicts who tried to remain inviolable. Every newly arrived prisoner, especially Muslim, was inevitably presented to specially selected sex fiend convicts. Boboev threatened me saying “If you do not take a different belief then I’ll order them to rape you.” In the East allowing a man to rape you is considered as the most awful shame.

It was cold, and I had aches and pains all over. That’s why it was too painful for me changing my clothes to prison overalls. Then I was taken to a quarantine unit. There I was received by Hamro Parpiev, approved person [inmate] of prison administration. He used to say to me and others: “You should carry out that which I order to you. No matter you are young or an aged, healthy or sick one. You have asked for trouble yourselves by coming here.” This is the way he looked at the matters.

After breakfast and supper he used to force convicts to march for two hours. Also this monster-prisoner used to compel convicts to carry out absolutely useless work in the courtyard after breakfast, lunch and supper. At times such waste of time was continuing past midnight. Jeering at people, crushing their will – this was the purpose of such inventions. There was no benefit from these works at all. Neither for convicts nor for the prison. Throwing earth from one heap to another, hourly changing the heap places, moulding the loam into small pieces and burying them after they became dried, then once again puddling the loam and moulding it into small pieces and so continuously. Such work wasn’t interrupted even in winter. The warder-convict forced to puddle and mould the loam into pieces barehanded in cold.

In the courtyard the manager of the penal battalion was a convict by the name Quziboy from Marghilon. He always had a rubber hose with him. He was managing “ploughing” in a garden-plot. The “ploughing” meant the next: 10-12 prisoners were harnessed to brake to pull it where Quziboy was mounting on. If it seemed to him that someone pulled the brake badly then he used to lash him with his rubber hose. Another pastime he was taking a pleasure in was the dragging of a big concrete block from one place to another. He forced convicts to return the block to its former place.

In a quarantine unit water was lacking not only for washing but also for drinking. Each prisoner received two mugs of water a day – morning and evening. In huts where prisoners spent the night bed linen was completely lacking. Before going to bed prisoners would settle themselves on boards or the concrete floor five by five penned up together. Anyone who objected to this was lashed by Hamro Parpiev. Hamro and Quziboy are the most blood-thirsty and pitiless men I have witnessed in my life.

Besides, almost every day or every other day I was taken away to prison headquarters and beaten to repudiate from my belief [Islam]. Especially, I was cruelly tortured in rooms # 5, 6, 8, 9 and 10. When wardens caught sight of me performing my prayers, unknown to others, they summoned me to headquarters and punished me to puddle the loam in standing wave and mould it into small pieces or to pull the brake in addition to brutal beatings.

Convicts were forced to participate in different “creative contests”. In 2001 during one of such contests I was forced to play a part of a woman. I refused saying that it conflicts with my status of man and therefore it’s unacceptable to me. In response officer Shomurod brutally beat me in room #5.

In summer 2000 I was forced as a punishment to sit in the baking sun from 8.30a.m till 8.30pm. This kind of torture would last for more than a month. I came down with some diseases: heart attacks, my legs became paralysed, my tongue failed me, and I began to lose consciousness frequently. Then I was deported to medical unit where the head of the unit Arabov refused to treat me at all and deported me back. However, shortly after I felt bad again. I witnessed how captain Boboev would fling mud at prisoner Isroil from Beshariq while sex fiends were raping him.

That day I spent the time sitting in the sun and the incident just finished me – I lost consciousness after a heart attack. Instead of medical care officer Ikhtiyar pulled me away into his office and began to beat me. Then he ordered to me, Mamatov Qudratulla, Ahmedov and other prisoners to strip down to the skin and line up one after another to be “touched”. I refused to. I can’t recollect how long he beaten me.
I wrote only some of episodes of my existence in prison #64/51. Lately a representative of the religious committee came and distributed among prisoners a questionnaire. Having studied my answers he said: “You see, it turns out that you the most recalcitrant one. You will never go back home.“

Every time when my wife and children arrive to see me, traveling more than 1000 km I nearly go crazy with seeing their state. Excuse me, I can’t continue to write any longer. And the praise to Allah! Ameen!