of the vote. The OSCE election monitoring 373 and 375 of the Criminal Code. Only one mission found that voter choice was limited of the defendants took part in the hearing via by “undue restrictions on fundamental WhatsApp and the others only heard of the freedoms of association, peaceful assembly decision via the media in October. and expression”. On 15 September, parliament approved On 10 June, President Tokayev published a amendments to laws intended to protect Plan of Priority Measures for Human Rights children from cyberbullying. The which specifically mentioned the rights of amendments require foreign internet people with disabilities, elimination of platforms and messenger applications to discrimination against women and the rights register and have representatives in to freedom of association and expression but Kazakhstan, or face being blocked. Human omitted the right to freedom of peaceful rights defenders criticized these legislative assembly. changes as a means of unduly restricting the According to the WHO, by December there right to freedom of expression and access to had been 1,060,125 confirmed cases of information. Covid-19 and 17,972 deaths, and On 7 October, an ambulance driver, 16,813,018 vaccine doses had been Kenzhebulat Esimseitov, was detained and administered. On 6 September, compulsory questioned by police under Article 274 of the vaccination was introduced for workers in Criminal Code for “distribution of knowingly retail, sport, culture, health and local false information”. He was among 24 government organizations. Those not ambulance drivers who had signed a letter to vaccinated were required to take weekly officials complaining about conditions at the tests. Ambulance Service, including the failure to On 14 October, Kazakhstan was elected to pay drivers the additional sum due to them the UN Human Rights Council. because of the Covid-19 pandemic. At the On 29 December, President Tokayev signed end of the year the case had not been off a law abolishing the death penalty and closed, but was not being actively thus fulfilling the requirements for ratification investigated. of the Second Optional Protocol to the EXTREMISM LEGISLATION ICCPR. There was a rise in the number of people FREEDOM OF EXPRESSION convicted under Article 405 of the Criminal Code for membership of an “extremist” The authorities sought to silence criticism of organization. By October, there had been 47 the government using restrictive legislation. convictions, compared to 14 in 2020. All of Even though libel was decriminalized in those convicted had simply expressed 2020, the Criminal Code retains articles criticism of the government or supported the criminalizing “Public insults and other opposition movements Democratic Choice of attacks on the honour and dignity of the First Kazakhstan and Koshe Partiyasi, which had President” (Article 373) and “Attacks on the been arbitrarily declared “extremist” in honour and dignity of the President” (Article closed court sessions in 2018 and 2020, 375). respectively. On 10 August, a court in Taldykorgan ruled, On 11 October, Askhat Zheksebaev was in civil proceedings, that Serik Kulmyrza and sentenced to five years in prison for eight other people should remove social belonging to an “extremist party”. He was media posts because they insulted “the First one of the founders of Koshe Partiyasi and President of Kazakhstan” (Nursultan had been in detention since August 2020. He Nazarbayev) and “created a negative image was among 13 opposition activists convicted of the human rights situation in the country”. in a politically motivated trial. The court recommended that prosecutors On 4 February, prisoner of conscience Maks should open a criminal case under Articles Bokaev was released from detention after Amnesty International Report 2021/22 218