Human Rights in Uzbekistan - Overview

Overview

The U.S. Department of State has designated Uzbekistan a Country of Particular Concern for religious persecution.

Uzbekistan has become the first and the only Central Asian nation to abolish the death penalty in law and practice. The abolition, initiated by the August 2005 decrees of President Karimov, became effective on January 1, 2008. Capital punishment has been substituted by longer term deprivation of liberty and life sentencing.

Religious freedom is one of the most challenging issues in a predominantly Muslim environment, where only two mainstream religions - Orthodox Christianity and Judaism - are recognized and tolerated by the country's traditional society.

The constitution of the Republic of Uzbekistan asserts that "democracy in the Republic of Uzbekistan shall be based upon common human principles, according to which the highest value shall be the human being, his life, freedom, honor, dignity and other inalienable rights."

However, United States Department of State defines Uzbekistan as "an authoritarian state with limited civil rights" and IHF express profound concern about "wide-scale violation of virtually all basic human rights". According to the reports, the most widespread violations are torture, arbitrary arrests, and various restrictions of freedoms: of religion, of speech and press, of free association and assembly. The reports maintain that the violations are most often committed against members of religious organizations, independent journalists, human right activists, and political activists, including members of the banned opposition parties. In 2005, Uzbekistan was included into Freedom House's "The Worst of the Worst: The World's Most Repressive Societies".

The official position is summarized in a memorandum "The measures taken by the government of the Republic of Uzbekistan in the field of providing and encouraging human rights" and amounts to the following. The government does everything that is in its power to protect and to guarantee the human rights of Uzbekistan's citizens. Uzbekistan continuously improves its laws and institutions in order to create a more humane society. Over 300 laws regulating the rights and basic freedoms of the people have been passed by the parliament. For instance, an office of Ombudsman was established in 1996. On August 2, 2005, President Islom Karimov signed a decree that will abolish capital punishment in Uzbekistan on January 1, 2008.

Craig Murray, British ambassador 2002-2004, investigated human rights abuses, and, when his bosses at the Foreign and Commonwealth Office ignored his reports, went public, garnering international attention for the situation. He was dismissed, but continued to agitate against human rights abuse in the country. He also claimed there was extraordinary rendition by the United States of America to Uzbekistan, with surreptitious use of information obtained under torture as a result. Murray was removed from his post in October 2004, shortly after a leaked report in the Financial Times quoted him as claiming that MI6 used intelligence provided by Uzbek authorities through torture. The FCO denied there was any direct connection and stated that Murray had been removed for "operational" reasons. It claimed that he had lost the confidence of senior officials and colleagues. In his 2007 book Murder in Samarkand, Murray speculates that his anti-torture memos caused two problems for the US & UK governments. First, the CIA's extraordinary rendition program was secretly using Uzbekistan as a country to which to fly people to be tortured. Second, the transcripts of the torture sessions were then shared with Britain's MI6 because of the UK-US intelligence sharing agreements of WWII. By objecting to the UK's acceptance of CIA torture-obtained information, he was interfering with the secret rendition program as well as threatening the MI6's relationship with the CIA.

The 2005 civil unrest in Uzbekistan, which resulted in several hundred people being killed is viewed by many as a landmark event in the history of human rights abuse in Uzbekistan, A concern has been expressed and a request for an independent investigation of the events has been made by the United States, European Union, the UN, the OSCE Chairman-in-Office and the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights. The government of Uzbekistan is accused of unlawful termination of human life, denying its citizens freedom of assembly and freedom of expression. The government vehemently rebuffs the accusations, maintaining that it merely conducted an anti-terrorist operation, exercising only necessary force. In addition, some officials claim that "an information war on Uzbekistan has been declared" and the human rights violations in Andijan are invented by the enemies of Uzbekistan as a convenient pretext for intervention into the country's internal affairs.