Watchdog

Police in St. Petersburg have searched the apartment of a youth activist and confiscated his computer and other materials, RFE/RL's Russian Service reports.

Maksim Ivantsov is an active member of the Oborona (Defense) youth movement.

He also helps the Soldiers' Mothers of Petersburg organization.

Police say the search was conducted because they suspected Ivantsov of hiding weapons and drugs.

However, a fellow activist of the Oborona movement, Oleg Mukhin, tells RFE/RL that he believes police are trying to scare Ivantsov.

Mukhin says that without the materials confiscated by police, it will be almost impossible for Ivantsov to realize two of Oborona's human rights projects and issue a book that was planned for the summer.

European Union representatives are due to begin a human-rights dialogue with Uzbek authorities today in the capital, Tashkent.

Ahead of the meeting, the New York-based watchdog Human Rights Watch (HRW) has issued a lengthy report that details HRW's main concerns with respect to the human rights situation in Uzbekistan.

"The Uzbek government's human rights record, long marked by repression and abuse, has remained atrocious in the 12 months since the EU last held a human rights dialogue with Uzbekistan," HRW says in the introduction to the report.

"Civil society activists remain the target of constant government intimidation and harassment, and authorities continue to hold more than a dozen human rights defenders, journalists, and other independent civic and political activists on politically motivated grounds."

In addition, HRW says, the Uzbek government persists in its denial of accountability for the massacre of hundreds of mostly unarmed protesters fleeing a demonstration in the city of Andijon in May 2005.

The rights watchdog says it hopes the EU will use the Tashkent dialogue to express profound concern about the abysmal state of human rights in the country.

In its memorandum, HRW issues a set of recommendations of specific steps that it would like to see the EU take up with the Uzbek government, including the release of all wrongfully imprisoned human rights defenders, journalists, opposition members, and other activists.

The full HRW memorandum can be found here.