Through crowdsourcing, rights groups say they are documenting a campaign of beatings and torture.

One evening in early January, Yerlan Zhagiparov left his home to see what was happening nearby at the city’s Republic Square, a center of mass political protests. Less than half an hour later, Mr. Zhagiparov, 49, called a close friend to say he had been apprehended by the National Guard. The phone cut out after his friend heard him screaming in pain.

When his family found his naked, mutilated body in a city morgue six days later, his right hand had been broken and his face was swollen and red. He was still handcuffed, with gunshot wounds near his heart and abdomen.

His family wants an investigation into who killed him. Since his remains were found, other people have begun to come forward with accusations of abuse at the hands of Kazakh authorities.

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