28 March 2006 :

over 20 Kyrgyz prisoners sentenced to death have appealed to President Kurmanbek Bakiyev requesting their convictions be re-examined in a letter published by the local media.
It claims many of the convicts are innocent and disagree "with the sentences handed down by the previous regime's puppet judges." "Neither investigations nor courts proved the charges brought against us,"
the letter reads. "The criminal cases were fabricated by officials working for former
President Askar Akayev," it reads. "Every means was used to extract confessions while the true criminals
escaped unpunished," the letter continued.
The convicts urged Bakiyev to set up a working commission of representatives of the prosecutor's office, courts, legal experts and civil society "for a thorough investigation of criminal cases and to pass fair judgment on the basis of law."
"We are not asking for any favours or leniency, merely to be judged according to law. We hope that after a thorough study of these fabricated cases justice will finally triumph," the message concluded.