A court in Kazakhstan has sentenced a labour lawyer who backed hundreds of striking oil workers against the state energy company to six years in prison for enticing social disorder.
Rights groups immediately said the decision to imprison Natalia Sokolova broke the basic principal of free speech and accused Kazakhstan of misusing criminal law to crush a strike which has cost it millions of dollars.
"She was basically just doing her job," said Rachel Denber, Acting Executive Director of Human Rights Watch's Central Asia and Europe Division.
"To criminalise her actions is completely inconsistent with freedom of speech."
However, according to local media reports, the judge at the closed court hearing in the city of Aktau on the Caspian Sea coast said Sokolova had not just given legal advice to the strikers but also organised them and "enticed social disorder".
Hundreds of workers at two oil fields in the west of the country owned by Kazakh state energy company KazMunaiGas have been striking since the middle of May. They complain the authorities interfere in their unions and that their wages are not high enough.
KazMaunaiGas, which is part listed on the London Stock Exchange, has repeatedly told investors that under police pressure and the threat of being sacked, the strikers would return to work. Last month, though, it conceded the strike had cost the company around six per cent of the year's total output.
Industrial action is relatively rare in Kazakhstan and the oil strike has turned into one of the most high profile in the country's 20-year post-Soviet history. Last month British rock star Sting cancelled a concert planned for the Kazakh President's birthday in support of the strikers.
Ms Denber from Human Rights Watch said the authorities had used Sokolova to send out a warning to others.
"The authorities want to send a strong message to the workers about what the costs of going on strike are," she said.
Industrial action is relatively rare in Kazakhstan and the oil strike has turned into one of the most high profile in the country's 20-year post-Soviet history. Last month British rock star Sting cancelled a concert planned for the Kazakh President's birthday in support of the strikers.
Ms Denber from Human Rights Watch said the authorities had used Sokolova to send out a warning to others.
"The authorities want to send a strong message to the workers about what the costs of going on strike are," she said.
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