Polat Shamshetov

Polat Shamshetov was the former chief of the Karakalpakstan Interior Ministry’s Criminal Investigation Department. He was detained in July 2022 following mass protests in Nukus, Karakalpakstan, which were triggered by proposed constitutional amendments that would have removed the region's autonomous status. He was tried in the Bukhara Regional Court alongside 21 other defendants and sentenced to 6 years in prison on January 31, 2023, for inciting and participating in mass unrest. He died in custody at a Bukhara pre-trial detention centre on February 4, 2023, from what authorities cited as pulmonary embolism and acute heart failure.