All news on the topic: Azamat Ishenbekov

A Kyrgyz court freed a prominent investigative journalist after 18 months behind bars, placing her under a travel ban as she awaits a retrial in a case widely condemned as an attack on free speech.

On Wednesday, a Kyrgyz court sentenced two former employees of Kloop, a leading investigative newsroom and OCCRP partner, to five years in prison and handed three years of probation to two former accountants, all charged with conspiring to “incite mass unrest,” officials said. Lawyers and Kloop management have called the case baseless.

This week, four former employees from Kyrgyzstan’s leading investigative newsroom, Kloop, stood trial in Bishkek, accused of conspiring to “incite mass unrest.”