Kazakh Woman Starts NGO For Victims Of Government Crime

Rakhat Aliev

ALMATY -- Armangul Kapasheva, whose husband is still missing after he was kidnapped in February 2007, says she is creating a nongovernmental organization to protect those mistreated by government officials.

Kapasheva told RFE/RL's Kazakh Service that a priority of her new organization, called the Taghdyr (Destiny) Human Rights Foundation, will be the extradition of Rakhat Aliev, who was convicted in absentia of a variety of charges, including the kidnapping of her husband, Nurbank manager Joldas Timraliev, in January 2007.

Aliev, the former son-in-law of Kazakh President Nursultant Nazarbaev, is living in exile in Vienna, where he had been Kazakhstan's ambassador to Austria.

An Austrian court turned down Astana's extradition request for Aliev in 2007, saying he could not expect a fair Kazakh trial.