Translation of Zhanna’s post

The hottest topic discussed in Kazakhstan during the last two weeks is publication of the book by Rakhat Aliev, who formerly was the ambassador and son-in-law of the president of Kazakhstan. Nowadays he is the state criminal hiding away abroad from the justice, which sentenced him to 40 years in prison for kidnapping, running organized criminal group and attempt of coup d’etat.

He announced “Godfather-In-Law” book two years ago, as soon as his prosecution had been started, but the book was published only recently. It is obvious that this person – ex-husband of the president’s eldest daughter, former senior official of special services and olygarch – knows some considerable secrets of politics in Kazakhstan from inside. And for the past years he has been constantly proving it by leaking the wiretapped telephone conversations of Kazakhstani higher officials to the Web.

Based on the fact of the book publication the General Prosecutor’s Office immediately initiated the criminal case, since book publication was qualified as “illegal violation of secrecy of correspondence, telephone conversations or other communications”. Rakhat Aliev is the accused one, and the book is the material evidence, as it was clarified by the prosecutor’s office. At the same time, there was the lecture read to the editors of opposition newspapers; they were explained that the publication of the information contained in the book would also result in their criminal responsibility.

Distribution and even reading (!) of “Godfather-in-Law” are also subject to criminal responsibility, since law-enforcement authorities would qualify these actions as rendering of assistance to Rakhat Aliev, the criminal.