Director, Kazakhstan International Bureau for Human Rights and Rule of Law

Yevgeniy Zhovtis is the director of the Kazakhstan International Bureau for Human Rights and Rule of Law, founder and board member of the "Bota" Foundation, board member of the Central Eurasia Project of the Open Society Institute, and a participant in a Working Group on Reform of Electoral Legislation in Kazakhstan.  He has received several honors for his work in human rights over the last decade, including the 1998 USA and European Union Democracy and Civil Society Award, the 1999 International League for Human Rights Award, the 2005 International Helsinki Federation Recognition Award, and the 2007 Friedrich Ebert Stiftung Human Rights Award.

In the early 1990s, Mr. Zhovtis worked for the Independent Trade Union Center of Kazakhstan, now the Confederation of Free Trade Unions of Kazakhstan. He left this work to study law in 1996, and in 1999 graduated with honors from the High Law School "Adilet" in Almaty, Kazakhstan. In 2002 he was named the Best Lawyer of Kazakhstan. Mr. Zhovtis has published more than 150 publications on the problems of democratization and economic transformation, and on the human rights situation and rule of law in Kazakhstan, and has lectured extensively on these topics at various universities.

Mr. Zhovtis has chaired various committees, such as the Forum of Democratic Forces of Kazakhstan and the Board of Directors of "Soros-Kazakhstan" Foundation. He has also participated in the Consultative Council on the Problems of Public Policy; the Working Group on Abolition of the Death Penalty; the OSCE Expert Panel on Freedom of Assembly; the Expert Council attached to the Commission on Human Rights under the President of Kazakhstan; the Expert Council on Free Access to Justice attached to the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Kazakhstan; the Open Society Institute Sub-Board on Law, Human Rights, and Criminal Justice; the Kazakhstan Democracy Informational Network; the "Interlegal" Foundation; the Civil Movement "Azamat"; and the Social-Democratic Party of Kazakhstan.

On 26 July 2009, Mr. Zhovtis was involved in a car accident, resulting in the tragic death of a pedestrian, Kanat Moldabayev. It is now clear that Kazakhstani authorities exploited this unfortunate accident to politicize the investigation and punish Mr. Zhovtis for his human rights work, evidenced by the fact that the investigation and the subsequent trial were rife with procedural violations.  Mr. Zhovtis was convicted and sentenced to serve a four-year prison term on 3 September 2009.  The Steering Committee of the World Movement has issued several statements in support of Mr. Zhovtis and his appeal process. On December 9, 2010, in "Planet Gulag," Freedom House and Foreign Policy listed Mr. Zhovtis as one of the top 15 most important imprisoned dissidents in the world.

On November 10, 2010, Mr. Zhovtis recorded a message for the participants of the Parallel OSCE Conference held on November 28-29, in Astana, Kazakhstan.  In his message, Mr. Zhovtis calling on civil society in the former Soviet Union to transform itself and become a part of political decision-making processes.