In Midst of Deadly Uzbek Protest, a Baffled Businessman

But Maksataliev and others in the camp said he and his 22 fellow defendants had little interest in religion or politics. By their account, they were simply successful businessmen who were targeted by a paranoid government that perceived anyone with prestige as a threat. Most of the people in the square were peaceful, ordinary citizens, the men said.

"They were not terrorists," said Maksataliev, 45. "They were just people who had had enough."

Maksataliev is a burly man with salt-and-pepper stubble on his chin and the look of a boxer. But when he spoke about the ironworks factory that he founded five years ago, his voice thickened with the emotion of one speaking of a lost child.

"We employed 54 workers," he said wistfully. "It was really professional. They were all given uniforms, a free lunch and money for transportation."

In 2003, his company and those belonging to many of the 22 other businessmen took top honors at an exposition showcasing businesses in Andijon. Looking back, Maksataliev wonders if that was the moment when he aroused the suspicion of authorities.

"Maybe Karimov was afraid of us because we were growing stronger and we all knew each other and were helping each other like a network," Maksataliev said. "I think he worries that this means we could someday take him out of power."

Sometimes, Maksataliev added, he did think about the need for more democracy -- "especially when I would watch Russian television and watch Vladimir Zhirinovsky speak about how we Uzbeks are like sheep, just led by one person." Zhirinovsky is an ultranationalist Russian politician.

But Maksataliev said he was far too busy building his business to act on such ideas. So he was completely shocked, he said, when one morning last June, Uzbek officials packed in two cars forced him off the road on his way to work and bundled him off to the city's interrogation center.

He was kept there without being charged for more than a month, he said.

Then he was transferred to a 6-by-13-foot cell in Andijon's main prison and held there with five other inmates. One was a thief, he said, another a drug dealer.

Human rights groups allege that the Uzbek government has engaged in extreme forms of torture and executions such as boiling prisoners alive.

Maksataliev said that he was not physically mistreated and that his family was allowed to visit him frequently. But he said he suffered the mental torture of watching his business collapse as Uzbek authorities spent seven months combing his records for evidence of malfeasance.