...In 2021, PA ‘Kadir-Kasiet’, together with the Business & Human Rights Resource Centre, conducted research into the situation regarding the protection of human rights defenders in the field of corporate accountability in the period from 2016 to 2020...

The following conclusions were drawn from the survey:

• The narrowing of human rights defenders’ field of action has been noticed, as well as the use of the pandemic to curb ‘inconvenient’ activities. Human rights defenders working on corporate accountability are not adequately protected from threats.
• Private companies are not allies of human rights defenders. The State does not recognize the restrictions on civil society activists’ rights, which is one of the reasons for threats they receive.
• Sometimes Western companies approach civil society activists, yet they are still advancing their own interests, with the exception of Chinese companies that do not cooperate with civil society. Not all companies are ready for a human rights dialogue; there is no support from the authorities...

The monitoring of the security situation of the business-related human rights defenders identified that 379 persons received 693 threats over 5 years from 516 sources in 23 cities and regions of Kazakhstan...