Nazarbayev approves big prisoner amnesty

    Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev has enacted an amnesty for tens of thousands of people who are behind bars in the Central Asian nation.
    Before signing an amnesty bill into law on December 13, Nazarbayev said that the amnesty would affect some 28,000 convicts and people held in pretrial detention.
    Of those, Nazarbayev said, some 1,500 will be released, 80 percent of them on parole. Others will have their sentences reduced.
    Nazarbayev proposed the amnesty in late November to mark the 25^th anniversary of Kazakhstan's independence, which is celebrated on December 16. The bill was approved by the parliament earlier in December.
    Nazarbayev said that Kazakhstan had eight mass amnesties for prisoners since it gained independence in 1991.
    Some 36,000 persons are currently either serving prison sentences or awaiting trial in the nation of 17 million, according to RFE/RL.