Slain Kyrgyz journalists Alisher Saipov and Gennady Pavlyuk were commemorated in Bishkek.
Dozens of local journalists, human rights activists, parliament deputies, and public figures brought flowers and lit candles to commemorate Saipov and Pavlyuk, whose murders in 2007 and 2009 shook Kyrgyz society.
The commemorations were held in front of a monument to Pavlyuk, a bronze statue of the journalist unveiled last year.
Saipov, a Kyrgyz citizen of Uzbek origin who was chief editor of the newspaper "Siyosat" ("Politics"), was shot dead near his office in his native city of Osh in southern Kyrgyzstan on October 24, 2007.
Saipov, a Kyrgyz citizen of Uzbek origin who was chief editor of the newspaper "Siyosat" ("Politics"), was shot dead near his office in his native city of Osh in southern Kyrgyzstan on October 24, 2007.
Saipov had also worked for Voice of America's Uzbek Service and RFE/RL, and often wrote about political and social issues in neighboring Uzbekistan. His colleagues and human rights activists say he was killed for his critical articles about Uzbek officials. Saipov's killers have never been found.
On October 24, the fourth anniversary of Saipov's murder, the presidential office announced that President Roza Otunbaeva supports the proposal to mark October 24 as Kyrgyzstan's Day to Fight for Freedom of Speech.
Pavlyuk, a prominent Kyrgyz journalist of Russian origin known in Kyrgyzstan under the pseudonym Rustam Ibragimbek, died after being thrown from a high-rise building in Almaty, Kazakhstan, in December 2009 with his arms and legs bound.
On October 11, a court in Almaty found three men guilty of killing Pavlyuk, and sentenced them to long prison terms.
Read more in Kyrgyz here
Read more in Kyrgyz here
