Activist freed in Uzbekistan after 12 years in prison

TASHKENT: Uzbekistan has released an activist who was jailed for nearly 12 years after a bloody crackdown on protesters in the east of the country, rights groups said on Saturday.

Isroil Kholdarov, a human rights and political activist from Andijan, scene of a brutal crackdown on protesters, was freed from a jail in the capital Tashkent earlier this week, a member of the rights group Ezgulik said.

"He is well", Ezgulik’s Abdurakhmon Tashanov told AFP. "He wants to rest a while and undergo some health checks," he said, adding that Kholdarov planned to return to the eastern city of Andijan.

Kholdarov was a member of the Erk political party banned for its opposition to late Uzbek leader Islam Karimov and documented rights abuses in Andijan.

In 2005, the Uzbek government violently suppressed a popular uprising in Andijan, leaving hundreds dead, according to some estimates.

The bloody crackdown marked a watershed moment in the Central Asian country’s descent into authoritarianism under Karimov.