Tokbergen Abiyev

Tokbergen Abiyev (, Toqbergen Ábıev) is a Kazakh journalist. An editor of the paper Zakon i Pravosudiye, an Astana-based newspaper which specializes in documenting government corruption, he went missing on 20 December 2012, just hours after he announced to the Kazakh media that he had a sensational news report about to be published. Abiyev reappeared on 4 January 2013.

Incarceration Abiyev spent July 2008 to May 2011 in jail, after being convicted of bribing a representative of the Agency of the Republic of Kazakhstan for Fighting Economic and Corruption Crimes (Financial Police), with the intent of obtaining information on judicial law enforcement agents. He claimed his arrest was linked to his editorial position at Zakon i Pravosudie.

Disappearance On 20 December 2012, Abiyev sent an email to fellow journalists stating:

He went on to explain the news conference, titled "The corrupt must be jailed" would expose despotism and corruption in Astana.

Reappearance On 4 January 2013, Abiyev reappeared, stating that "he had staged his abduction in order to draw the attention of both the public and government to his fight against corruption."