Kyrgyz Journalist Baktygul Chynybaeva Faces Harassment and False Accusations
New York, NY — The director of the Journalism Protection Initiative at the Craig Newmark Graduate School of Journalism at CUNY, Joel Simon, wrote today to Kyrgyzstan’s Acting Minister of Justice Almaz Aiylchiev urging him to protect the rights of journalist Baktygul Chynybaeva.
Chynybaeva, one of Kyrgyzstan’s most renowned journalists, has experienced extraordinary threats and harassment, including most recently a video falsely accusing her and her husband of being spies.
Chynybaeva was named a Knight Press Freedom Fellow in the fall of 2025. The program, which supports journalists at risk from around the world, is administered by the JPI. Chynybaeva spent her fellowship year at the University of Michigan, where she was a Knight-Wallace Journalism Fellow in 2024-25, and where she is currently pursuing her MA in International and Regional Studies.
Over the years, Chynybaeva has reported extensively on a range of topics including climate change, human rights, health care and alleged government corruption in Kyrgyzstan. She was a long-time correspondent for RFE/RL, the US Congressionally-funded news service.
While traveling to Prague in December 2023, Chynybaeva was detained at the international airport in Bishkek, interrogated, searched, and accused of being a spy. After being selected as a Knight-Wallace Fellow in 2024 and relocating to Michigan, Chynybaeva’s computer was hacked and much of her investigative materials were lost. Chynybaeva has experienced waves of online harassment, some of it sexualized in nature. Through online sleuthing, she determined that some of the accounts that were trolling and harassing her belonged to government officials in Kyrgyzstan.
Kyrgyz authorities have closely monitored the activities of Chynybaeva and her husband Ibraim Nurakun Uulu since they moved to the US. Nurakun Uulu worked as a journalist and producer for the BBC from 2003 to 2015.
On August 16, Nurakun Uulu posted critical comments about President Japarov on his personal Facebook page. Ten days later, a video also posted to Facebook falsely accused Chynybaeva and Nurakun Uulu of engaging in espionage. On August 29, President Sadyr Japarov declared publicly that his government was going to be punishing “enemies of the people” very harshly, including those who are living abroad.
“These combined actions suggest that Chynybaeva and Nurakun Uulu are being targeted for government reprisal, and that the threat could extend outside their country,” Simon wrote in the letter. “The videos and false accusations pose a significant risk to them, and potentially to their relatives in Kyrgyzstan, as part of a government pressure campaign that clearly contravenes international norms and protections.”
For more information on the Knight Press Freedom Fellowship Program click here.
The full text of the letter in support of Baktygul Chynybaeva is available in English and Russian.