Affiliated media: North Kazakhstan media, Media outlets

Incident date: July 20, 2017

Attack type:

• Illegal impediments to journalistic activity, denial of access to information

Source: Adil Soz

Location: Kazakhstan, South Kazakhstan Province, Petropavlovsk

Additional information:

On July 20th, before a meeting on flood control events with the participation of the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan and residents of the village of Zarechny (in the outskirts of the city of Petropavlovsk), an employee of the mayor's office of the North Kazakhstan region walked through the ranks of assembled journalists and invited them to voluntarily come out and hand over their mobile phones. Persuasion and assurances that the phones would be put on silent mode, and that many journalists use gadgets as voice recorders and cameras, did not help. Journalists were forced to hand over their mobile devices. As a result, most journalists who were unable to make a voice recording of the event or take photos were forced to seek help from their colleagues, who had stationary voice recorders.