Uzbekistan's Imprisoned Human Rights Defenders

Human Rights Watch calls on the Uzbek government to immediately and unconditionally release all wrongfully imprisoned activists, several of whom suffer from serious illness and at least seven of whom have been ill-treated or subjected to torture in prison, and urges Uzbekistan's partners to make their freedom a top priority in their dialogues with the Uzbek government.

Uzbek authorities continue to hold in prison at least thirteen human rights defenders for no reason other than their legitimate human rights work. They are: Solijon Abdurakhmanov, Azam Formonov, Nosim Isakov, Gaibullo Jalilov, Alisher Karamatov, Jamshid Karimov, Norboi Kholjigitov, Rasul Khudainasarov, Ganihon Mamatkhanov, Habibulla Okpulatov, Yuldash Rasulov, Dilmurod Saidov, and Akzam Turgunov.

Many other civil society activists, including independent journalists and political dissidents, are likewise serving sentences on politically motivated charges, such as Yusuf Jumaev, a poet and political dissident sentenced to five years in a penal colony after calling for President Islam Karimov's resignation in the run-up to the December 2007 presidential elections. According to his family, Jumaev continues to suffer ill-treatment in prison and is in very poor health. His family reported that in June last year, Jumaev was subjected to repeated beatings by his cellmates, but prison authorities ignored his requests to be moved. Then, in late October, without explanation, prison authorities made Jumaev stand out in the cold and in the heavy rain for approximately two hours.

Some of the activists featured here worked to shed light on the May 2005 massacre in Andijan, others worked to protect farmers' rights, document torture, and expose corruption and religious persecution. They are all in prison as a result of daring to take on such work.

Solijon Abdurakhmanov
Abdurakhmanov (b. 1950) is a Karakalpakstan-based independent and outspoken journalist who has written on sensitive issues such as social and economic justice, human rights, corruption, and the legal status of Karakalpakstan in Uzbekistan. He worked closely with UzNews.net, an independent online news agency, and also freelanced for Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, Voice of America, and the Institute for War and Peace Reporting. He also is a member of the human rights group "Committee for the Protection of Personal Rights."

Traffic police arrested Abdurakhmanov on June 7, 2008, when they stopped his car, allegedly to check his identity, and claimed they found drugs on the underside of his car. Abdurakhmanov denies knowing about or having anything to do with the drugs. His brother, Bakhrom, a lawyer who also represented him, and fellow human rights defenders believe that the police planted the drugs. During the pre-trial investigation, the authorities primarily questioned Abdurakhmanov about his journalistic activities.

On October 10, 2008, following a trial that failed to meet fair trial standards, Abdurakhmanov was found guilty of a fabricated charge of selling drugs and sentenced to 10 years in prison. The sentence has been upheld twice on appeal. Abdurakhmanov is currently held in prison colony 64/61 in Karshi.

Farkhad Mukhtarov, another human rights activist who had earlier served prison time with Solijon Abdurakhmanov in Karshi before his release in December 2010, told Human Rights Watch that Abdurakhmanov had been charged with numerous violations of the prison regime to make him ineligible for amnesty or early release.  These alleged violations included ‘not marching correctly' or ‘not sweeping up his cell', even though prison authorities have never provided him with a broom.

According to Abdurakhmanov's relative, in February 2011, Abdurakhmanov gave his lawyer a written complaint to submit to the Supreme Court, but the document was confiscated by prison authorities who claimed they would send it themselves. As of this writing, however, there has been no reported outcome and it is not clear if the complaint was submitted.

Azam Formonov
Formonov (b. 1978) was an active member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan in Gulistan, in Syrdaryo province, who along with fellow defender Alisher Karamatov monitored violations of social and economic rights, in particular the rights of farmers and the disabled.

Formonov was arrested on April 29, 2006 and sentenced on June 15, 2006 to nine years in prison by the Yangier City Court on charges of attempting to blackmail a local businessman. He was tried without the presence of either his attorney of choice or his non-attorney public defender, Tolib Yakubov, then-chair of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan, who now lives in exile. A week before the sentencing, in a private conversation at the prison with Yakubov, he described how he had been tortured and pressured into signing a false confession.

Formonov is currently held at strict-regime Jaslyk prison (a violation of the terms of his verdict which specified that he be put into a "general" regime prison). Formonov has alleged he was tortured since being placed there, including being stripped of his overclothing and left in an unheated punishment cell for 23 days in January 2008, when temperatures reached approximately -20 C. More recently, Formonov told his family that on November 26, 2010, he and six cellmates in his brigade were placed in a punishment cell for 10 days.  Before he was locked up, prison officers reportedly pressured Formonov into signing a document under threats that the rest of his brigade would be beaten if he refused.

Formonov's family told Human Rights Watch that he has been repeatedly prevented from being eligible for amnesty because the authorities bring charges of violations of the prison regime against him. The alleged violations included such actions as "helping prisoners write appeals," although Formonov says he was never in possession of a pen and at most only spoke to others about how to appeal their sentences.

Nosim Isakov
Isakov (b. 1966) is a member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan who monitored human rights abuses in Jizzakh city.

Isakov was arrested on October 27, 2005, and charged with hooliganism on the basis of a neighbor's written complaint stating that he exposed himself in public to his neighbor's teenage daughter. Isakov's family and fellow human rights defenders found the accusation particularly shocking and offensive because he is a pious Muslim. At his trial, which began December 15, 2005, Isakov maintained his innocence and told the judge that while in pre-trial detention he had been beaten on his head with a bottle filled with water.

On December 20, 2005, Isakov was handed an eight-year prison sentence on multiple charges including hooliganism and extortion.  According to local sources, Isakov is serving his sentence at Karshi Prison and his family members have been warned not to speak to anyone about him.

Gaibullo Jalilov
Jalilov (b. 1964) is a Karshi-based human rights defender who has been a member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan since 2003. His work has focused on the crackdown on independent Muslims in the Kashkadarya region of Uzbekistan. At the time of his arrest in September 2009, he reportedly had collected information on over 200 arrests of independent Muslims in the region.

On January 18, 2010, in a trial that did not adhere to fair trial standards, the Kashkadarya District Criminal Court sentenced Jalilov to nine years in prison on fabricated charges of anti-constitutional activity, production and distribution of banned material, and membership in a banned religious organization. On March 9, 2010, the nine-year sentence was upheld on appeal.  Jalilov was brought to the hearing with a swollen eye, suggesting that he recently had been ill-treated in custody.

Just seven months after his original conviction, on August 4, 2010, Jalilov was re-sentenced to 11 years, one month and five days on new criminal charges, allegedly on the basis of new evidence, in a trial that did not meet fair trial standards. Jalilov is serving his sentence in a prison in Zangiyota district, not far from Tashkent.

After a two-day visit in January 2011, Jalilov's wife told Human Rights Watch that since his arrest, Jalilov has repeatedly been tortured and ill-treated, including by being beaten with a nightstick that left him nearly deaf in both ears. His family also reported that Jalilov's lungs cause him pain (Jalilov has a previous lung condition) and that he is suffering from vertebral hernia.

On May 3, Jalilov called his wife to tell her that starting April 25, he spent approximately one week at the prison clinic in Tashkent because of a bad cough that caused him to have serious difficulty breathing, and requested that his wife bring medicines to their next visit in early June. Jalilov is in urgent need of appropriate medical care.

Alisher Karamatov
Karamatov (b. 1968) is an active member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan in Gulistan, in Syrdaryo province who along with fellow defender Azam Formonov monitored violations of social and economic rights, in particular the rights of farmers and the disabled.

Karamatov was arrested on April 29, 2006, and sentenced on June 15, 2006 to nine years in prison on fabricated extortion charges following a trial that independent observers determined was unfair. According to his public defender, Karamatov confessed to the charges after being tortured, including being beaten on the soles of his feet and suffocated with a gas mask.

Karamatov's wife told Human Rights Watch that he has been in very poor health since he was put in prison.  In October 2008, Karamatov was transferred to the prison clinic 64/18 where he was diagnosed with an advanced form of tuberculosis in both lungs. Since January 2011, he has been serving his sentence in prison colony UYa 64/49 in Karshi.  After his wife visited him in early April, she reported that Karamatov has continued to lose weight and is very thin, has developed sores all over his body and wakes up with traces of blood in his mouth.

Prison officials have repeatedly accused Karamatov of violating internal prison rules to render him ineligible for amnesty or early release. His alleged violations include ‘saying prayers' and ‘wearing a white shirt'. Previously, on December 30, 2008, when Karamatov refused to sign a document attesting a breach of the prison regime, prison guards reportedly escorted him outside, took off his hat and jersey, and made him stand in freezing temperatures for nearly four hours in order to force him to sign the document.

On April 25, 2011, Karamatov's wife appealed to the office of the Ombudsman requesting that Karamatov be released on medical grounds due his "critical health condition." 

Jamshid Karimov
Karimov (b. 1968) is an independent journalist from Jizzakh and vocal critic of the government's policies who regularly published articles on the internet, including on Uznews.net.

Karimov disappeared on September 12, 2006, while attempting to visit his mother at the Jizzakh Province Hospital. Soon thereafter Karimov was forcibly admitted to the Samarkand Psychiatric Hospital where according to unconfirmed reports, he was subjected to forcible treatment with antipsychotic drugs. There is no medical basis for Karimov's confinement or treatment, and it is widely believed that he is being held for no reason other than his journalistic activities.

Human Rights Watch has received worrying reports indicating that Karimov's family has been harassed and intimidated by the authorities and warned not to speak with anyone about his case.  In late spring 2008 Karimov's mother passed away and he was allowed to attend the funeral and to be with his family for five days, but was instructed not to contact anyone outside the immediate family during this time.

Norboi Kholjigitov
Kholjigitov (b. 1953) is a member of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan in Samarkand province who defended farmers' rights, assisting farmers fighting expropriation of their farms. After working as the director of two state-owned farms he established his own farm, called Free Peasants, in 2004, and supported the poor.

Kholjigitov was arrested on June 4, 2005 and sentenced on October 18, 2005 to 10 years in prison on fabricated charges of extortion and slander. Since his imprisonment, Kholjigitov has faced ill-treatment and harassment by prison authorities, particularly after sending a complaint to the Supreme Court of Uzbekistan in November 2008. Prison officials have reportedly threatened him with transfer to a psychiatric clinic if he continues to file complaints. He is serving his sentence in prison colony UYa 64/49 in Karshi.

According to Kholjigitov's family, who met with him twice in recent months, Kholjigitov's health continues to progressively deteriorate. Kholjigitov suffers from a severe form of diabetes.  He has lost more weight and has great difficulty walking.  He has also apparently lost partial control of his right arm and legs due to complications from diabetes and has lost feeling in his feet. All of his teeth have fallen out, and he reportedly has stomach problems as he is unable to fully chew his food. His wife reported that he was unable to sit up as he has sores on his lower backside.

Kholgijitov reported that prison authorities have ignored his repeated requests to be transferred to the prison clinic in Tashkent for medical treatment. He is in urgent need of appropriate medical care.

Abdurasul Khudainasarov
Khudainasarov (b. 1956) is the head of the Angren branch of the human rights organization Ezgulik where his work focused on fighting corruption in the police and security forces.

Khudainasarov was arrested on July 21, 2005 and sentenced on January 12, 2006, to nine and one-half years in prison on fabricated charges of extortion, fraud, abuse of power, and falsification of documents. In a letter to his lawyer, Khudainasarov complained about beatings and ill-treatment he was subjected to the day after his trial ended. According to the letter, Khudainasarov was also put in a punishment cell the day after the verdict was issued in retribution for not confessing during the trial.

Khudainasarov is serving his sentence at a prison colony in Bekabad. His relatives reported to Human Rights Watch that he has suffered torture and ill-treatment in prison. Khudainasarov has filed complaints with the prosecutor's office and went on a temporary hunger strike to protest his ill-treatment. According to his wife, Khudainasarov attempted suicide in early fall 2008 and was rescued by fellow inmates.  His wife was able to visit with him in early April 2011 and reported that he looked pale and weak, that he suffers frequent headaches and rheumatism in his legs, and that his nervous system is damaged. 

Ganihon Mamatkhanov
Mamatkhanov (b. 1951) is a Ferghana-based human rights defender affiliated with the group Committee for the Protection of Individual Rights. He works on the protection of social and economic rights, including the rights of farmers, a number of whom were the victims of land confiscation in 2009. Before his arrest, Mamatkhanov regularly provided commentary on the human rights situation in Ferghana to Radio Ozodlik, the Uzbek branch of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Authorities arrested Mamatkhanov on October 9, 2009, under circumstances that appear to have been staged to frame him. He was sentenced to five years in prison on November 25, 2009, on fabricated charges of fraud and bribery. His trial was marred by serious procedural violations. Witnesses reportedly claimed that the investigator had instructed them how to act and what to say before and after Mamatkhanov's arrest.

Mamatkhanov's five-year prison sentence was converted to four and one-half years in a penal colony (koloniya poseleniya) on appeal at the Ferghana Regional Court in mid-January 2010. However, after allegedly violating the terms of his imprisonment in the penal colony, Mamatkhanov was transferred to a general regime prison in the Navoi region in spring 2010. 

During a visit in January 2011, Mamatkhanov complained to his family of heart pain and bouts of high blood pressure. In October 2009, not long after he was detained, Mamatkhanov reportedly suffered two heart attacks while in detention.

Habibulla Okpulatov
Okpulatov (b. 1950) is a member of the Ishtikhan District Branch of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan and worked as a teacher in a school in Samarkand until his arrest on June 4. 2005. He was tried along with fellow human rights defender Norboi Kholjigitov by the Samarkand Regional Court and on October 18, 2005, was sentenced to six years in prison. This sentence was later reduced to four years under amnesty.  Okpulatov is serving his sentence in prison colony 64/45 in Almalyk.

On September 30, 2009, Okpulatov was sentenced to an additional three years and eight days in prison by the Navoi City Criminal Court for alleged violations of prison regulations. The verdict stated that the court hearing was open to the public, but neither Okpulatov's relatives nor his lawyer were informed of the date of the trial, which took place in the prison.

After a visit with Okpulatov in late January 2011, his family reported there were some improvements in his health and that he had gained some weight, although his right leg is still debilitated. He told his family that allegations of prison regime violations continue to be brought against him, most recently in December 2010, when he was accused of using a dirty towel.

Yuldash Rasulov
Rasulov (b. 1969) has been a member of the Kashkadarya branch of the Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan since 2002. He worked to defend the rights of people persecuted for their religious beliefs and affiliations, especially those whose religious practice falls beyond the confines of state-sponsored Islam.

Rasulov was arrested in April 2007 sentenced in October 2007 to 10 years in prison on charges that included alleged anti-constitutional activity and membership in a banned religious organization. He is being held in prison colony No. 64/25 in Karabulbazar in the Bukhara region.

Authorities had previously brought politically motivated charges against Rasulov, sentencing him in September 2002 to a seven-year prison terms for attempting to overthrow the constitutional order, distributing "extremist" literature and membership in a banned religious organization. However, the evidence presented against Rasulov in court only showed that he prayed five times a day and had listened to tapes on Islam commonly available in the mid-1990s. Rasulov stated at trial that self-incriminating statements about his alleged involvement in "extremist" activities were made after he had been pressured. He was released after spending roughly seven months in detention.

Dilmurod Saidov
Saidov (b. 1962) is an independent journalist who has worked to expose corruption, abuse of power, and the general social and economic situation in the Samarkand region. His articles have been published in many local newspapers, as well as by internet new agencies Voice of Freedom and Uznews.net, among others. Saidov is a member of the Tashkent Regional Branch of Ezgulik, and since 2004 had been actively helping farmers defend their rights in the Samarkand region.

Saidov was arrested on February 22, 2009 at his home in Tashkent on fabricated charges of extortion. On July 30, 2009, after a flawed investigation and a trial riddled with procedural violations, the Tailak District Court in Samarkand sentenced Saidov to 12 and one-half years in prison.

Saidov's sentence has been upheld twice on appeal. During a meeting with his lawyer in late February 2010, Saidov asked him to submit a written statement he had prepared to the Supreme Court, but the document was confiscated by prison authorities as his lawyer tried to leave their meeting. Saidov told his family that he was later "punished."

In February 2010, Saidov was transferred to prison clinic UYa 64/18 in Tashkent to receive medical treatment (Saidov suffers from an acute form of tuberculosis), but according to his family, sometime in late summer 2010, Saidov was transferred back to prison colony UYa 64/36 in Navoi.

On August 11, 2010, Saidov's family made a direct appeal to the Ombudsperson for Human Rights Rashidova who met with the family, promised to "study the situation" and then later sent a written response on Nov. 9, 2010 to the family saying that her office had no jurisdiction over the matter. On February 8, 2011 his family tried again to have Saidov's case reviewed, , but in mid-March they received a response from the Supreme Court dismissing their request.

In December 2010, Saidov's relatives reported to Human Rights Watch that authorities had accused Saidov of multiple prison regime violations preventing him from being eligible for the 2010 amnesty. They also fear Saidov is being forced to take psychotropic drugs or other medications which cause him to be disoriented during prison visits.  According to Saidov's relatives' Saidov "has become a skeleton."

When a relative visited the prison on April 27, prison authorities told him that Saidov had been put into a punishment cell for allegedly violating prison regulations, but would not say which one.

In another tragedy for the imprisoned journalist, Saidov's wife, Barno Djumanova, and the couple's six-year-old daughter, Rukhshona, died in an automobile accident on November 5, 2009, on the Tashkent-Samarkand highway. They had travelled to Kiziltepe to deliver Saidov's passport to the prison administration.

Akzam Turgunov
Turgunov (b. 1952) founded the human rights group Mazlum and is a member of the opposition political party ERK. He is an advocate for the rights of political and religious prisoners and speaks out against torture, helping others fight the police system. In the months leading up to his arrest on July 11, 2008, Turgunov had been working in Karakalpakstan as a public defender in a number of sensitive cases.

On October 23, 2008, the Amurdarinskii court in Manget, Karakalpakstan, sentenced Turgunov to 10 years in prison on fabricated charges of extortion. Serious due process violations denied Turgunov a fair and impartial trial and he was tortured in custody. On July 14, 2008 while he was in the investigator's office writing a statement, someone poured boiling water down his neck and back, causing him to lose consciousness and sustain severe burns. Authorities ordered an investigation into Turgunov's torture only after he removed his shirt during a court hearing on September 16 to show the scars from the burns, which covered a large portion of his back and neck. The subsequent forensic medical exam, however, concluded that his burns were minor and did not warrant any action.

Turgunov's family told Human Rights Watch that since he was imprisoned, Turgunov has lost a significant amount of weight and is in very bad health. Turgunov is almost 60 years old, but is forced to work multiple shifts at a brick factory in the prison.  He continues to complain of severe leg pain as a result of this work, for which he is not given appropriate treatment.

His family visited him in mid-April 2011 and reported that Turgunov is frustrated that his efforts to have his case reviewed have not brought about any results.  According to his family, at least once a month Turgunov sends complaints to various government organs in Tashkent, including to the Supreme Court, the Prosecutor General and the Ombudsman, requesting that his case be reviewed.

Source

Government Shuts Down Human Rights Watch Office

On June 9, 2011, the Supreme Court of Uzbekistan granted the Ministry of Justice's petition to liquidate Human Rights Watch's Tashkent office registration. The hearing was brought forward from a later date without notice and the court deliberated for only a few minutes before granting the petition. There is no appeal. The legal ruling follows years of Uzbek government obstruction of Human Rights Watch's access to the country, including through denial of visas and accreditation to Human Rights Watch staff, most recently researcher Steve Swerdlow in December 2010. This obstruction amounted to the effective expulsion of Human Rights Watch from Uzbekistan, which we announced in March.

The Uzbek government continues its interference with independent civil society and its harassment of activists. Uzbekistan's international partners should make clear such interference and harassment are unacceptable, and impose concrete policy consequences for the government's continued failure to uphold the rights to association, assembly, and expression, and for its atrocious human rights record in general.
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(London) - The Uzbek government has forced Human Rights Watch to close its Uzbekistan office, Human Rights Watch said today. For years the government has obstructed the organization's work by denying visas and work accreditation to staff, and has now moved to liquidate its office registration, forcing Human Rights Watch to end its presence in Tashkent after 15 years.

"With the expulsion of Human Rights Watch, the Uzbek government sends a clear message that it isn't willing to tolerate critical scrutiny of its human rights record," said Kenneth Roth, executive director of Human Rights Watch. "But let me be clear, too: we aren't going to be silenced by this. We are as committed as ever to report on abuses in Uzbekistan."

On March 10, 2011, Human Rights Watch received information from the Supreme Court of Uzbekistan that the Justice Ministry had moved to liquidate the organization's office in Tashkent, with a first hearing apparently set for March 15. Human Rights Watch has been registered in Uzbekistan since 1996. Uzbek authorities have provided no information about the alleged grounds for the liquidation proceeding.

The Uzbek government had previously denied work accreditation to Human Rights Watch's Uzbekistan researcher, Steve Swerdlow, a decision conveyed in a letter handed to him by the Justice Ministry on Christmas Eve 2010. The letter states that the Ministry denied accreditation to Swerdlow because of Human Rights Watch's "established practice" of "ignoring Uzbekistan's national legislation" and because Swerdlow "lacks experience cooperating with Uzbekistan" and "working in the region as a whole." The letter does not specify what laws Human Rights Watch allegedly violated.

"Uzbek government claims that we ignore Uzbek legislation and ‘lack experience in the region' have been used repeatedly to deny accreditation to our staff," Roth said. "These claims are implausible and a transparently deceitful pretext to prevent us from maintaining a presence in the country."

Since 2004, the Uzbek government has interfered with the work of Human Rights Watch by denying or severely delaying visas and/or accreditation to every Human Rights Watch representative in Tashkent, and even threatened criminal charges against one staff member. The government has made it impossible for the organization to maintain a regular presence in the country since July 2008, when authorities denied accreditation to its former representative and then barred him from the country on the grounds that he "did not understand Uzbek culture or traditions." Swerdlow was allowed access to the country for only two months in 2010 before being denied work accreditation.

In the last two-and- a-half years, Uzbek authorities have further obstructed Human Rights Watch's attempts to work in Uzbekistan. In July 2009, they deported a Human Rights Watch research consultant upon her arrival in Tashkent. In December 2009, a Human Rights Watch researcher was the subject of a violent attack in the town of Karshi, which appeared to have been orchestrated by the authorities. Following the attack, police detained her and then expelled her from the city. Police in Karshi and Margilan also detained human rights defenders to prevent them from meeting with her.

Human Rights Watch's expulsion comes during a deepening human rights crisis in Uzbekistan. Well over a dozen human rights and political activists and independent journalists are in prison, torture and ill-treatment in the criminal justice system are systematic, and serious violations go unpunished. Over the last seven years, the Uzbek government has expelled nearly every international nongovernmental organization from the country. It also has consistently denied access to independent human rights monitors, such as United Nations special rapporteurs, no fewer than eight of whom have longstanding requests for invitation pending.

"The Uzbek government's persistent refusal to allow independent rights groups to carry out our work exacerbates the already dire human rights situation in the country, allowing severe abuses to go unreported, and further isolating the country's courageous and beleaguered human rights community," Roth said.

Human Rights Watch's expulsion from Tashkent also comes at a time of renewed engagement between Uzbekistan and the European Union. European Commission president Jose Manuel Barroso recently hosted the Uzbek president, Islam Karimov, a move that was widely criticized by human rights activists and the media. While the EU has repeatedly stated that enhanced relations are contingent on progress on human rights, it has not followed through with any known policy consequences in response to Uzbekistan's consistent failure to make concrete, demonstrable progress with respect to the EU's human rights criteria.

The United States, too, has in recent years pursued an active policy of re-engagement with Tashkent. It maintains a congressionally mandated visa ban against Uzbek officials linked to serious human rights abuses, but its relationship with Uzbekistan is dominated by the Defense Department, which uses routes through Uzbekistan as part of the Northern Distribution Network to supply forces in Afghanistan. With the exception of  Secretary of State Hillary Clinton's strong remarks during her December visit to Tashkent underscoring Uzbekistan's need to "translate words into practice" to improve its human rights record, the United States has made few public statements on rampant human rights violations in Uzbekistan.

Human Rights Watch called on the United States, and the EU and its member states  to  publicly condemn the Uzbek government's expulsion of Human Rights Watch and overall to pursue a more robust human rights policy with Tashkent.

"Uzbekistan has now unambiguously joined a short list of repressive governments that prevent Human Rights Watch from carrying out our work on the ground," Roth said. "Tashkent has apparently calculated that brutalizing the population and stonewalling international reporting are cost-free. The EU and the US need to prove this cynical calculus wrong and make sure human rights abuses will be noticed and carry clear consequences."

Human Rights Watch urged the Uzbek government to end the crackdown on civil society immediately and allow independent domestic and international human rights groups to operate without government interference. It should register groups that remain unregistered, have been liquidated or otherwise forced to stop working in Uzbekistan, and issue visas and accreditation for staff of international nongovernmental organizations.

Human Rights Watch remains committed to investigating human rights abuses in Uzbekistan and communicating its concerns to the Uzbek government.

The Human Rights Situation in Uzbekistan
The Uzbek government's human rights record is abysmal. Torture and ill-treatment are systematic throughout the criminal justice system. At least 13 human rights activists are in prison on fabricated charges, many of them in poor health. Other activists face threats, harassment, and live in fear of prosecution. The government severely restricts freedom of expression, and independent journalists are subject to crippling criminal defamation cases, which carry the prospect of jail time and huge fines. Many independent lawyers, especially those who took on politically sensitive cases, have been punitively disbarred. Independent Muslims and members of Christian communities are targets of repeated government repression.

Despite a speech  by Karimov to both houses of Parliament at the end of 2010, citing the need to strengthen civil society and the media environment, in practice Uzbekistan's citizens  are denied even the most basic civil and political rights, such as the rights to freedom of expression and assembly.

Uzbek authorities have also ignored all calls for an independent investigation into the 2005 Andijan massacre, when authorities shot and killed hundreds of protesters, most of them unarmed. The government continues to persecute and harass witnesses to the massacre and families of Andijan refugees.

Torture and Ill-Treatment
Torture in Uzbekistan is widespread and systematic in all stages of the criminal justice system, and impunity for torture is the norm. Police and security agents use torture and ill-treatment to coerce detainees to implicate themselves or others, and confessions obtained under torture are often the sole basis for convictions. Judges routinely fail to investigate torture allegations that defendants make when they appear before the court. Methods commonly used include beatings with truncheons, electric shock, hanging by wrists and ankles, rape and sexual humiliation, asphyxiation with plastic bags and gas masks, and threats of physical harm to relatives.

One prominent defense lawyer in Tashkent who has represented hundreds of criminal defendants told Human Rights Watch in October 2010:

"Based on the clients I visit in pre-trial detention facilities, I believe torture and ill-treatment have increased over the past several years.  The fact is, there is simply no one left to witness what is happening and communicate it to the world."

The desperation about torture among the clients I see now is near complete. I often meet clients who have clearly been ill-treated, with suspicious marks on their bodies in police custody. But when I see them in the interrogation room, they are so afraid of retribution and further torture by officers, and so convinced that the courts will not step in to end the practice, they ask me not even to raise the issue. They know that a lawyer may complain about torture to the court. But in the end it is he as a suspect who has to remain in the jail alone with the police officers, not the lawyer or the judge.

UN human rights bodies have found that torture is "systematic" and "routine" in Uzbekistan. The Uzbek government has failed to meaningfully carry out recommendations to combat torture made by these bodies, including most comprehensively by the UN special rapporteur on torture following his 2002 visit to the country. The Uzbek government routinely likes to tout measures such as recent habeas corpus amendments as evidence of progress on the issue of torture, but such measures have failed to protect detainees from torture or to end impunity for the practice.

In a key example, Human Rights Watch research revealed that the habeas corpus (judicial review of detention), amendments, introduced in January 2008, do not protect the rights of defendants or prevent torture and ill-treatment in pre-trial detention. Uzbek courts order the detention of suspects based on instructions from prosecutors and investigators and approve requests for arrest warrants in virtually every case. The operative legal standard does not allow courts to question the legality of a person's detention.  Courts do not use habeas corpus hearings to examine allegations of torture or ill-treatment in custody; nor does a pre-trial detainee have the right to request periodically that a court review his or her detention within a reasonable time.  Pre-trial detainees are routinely denied access to counsel at critical stages of the investigation, including interrogation and the habeas corpus hearing itself, which is a closed proceeding.  One lawyer told Human Rights Watch:

"I have never seen a single judge who did not approve a request for an individual's detention in the two years since the habeas reforms were adopted. The habeas corpus reforms stipulate that a criminal suspect must be presented to the court to approve his or her detention within 72 hours.... The problem, however, is that in so many cases people are first detained on administrative charges under which they can be held for 15 days, and during those 15 days the authorities can ill-treat and torture them very easily. Once the authorities have extracted the necessary confessions, they can then bring criminal charges, which trigger the habeas corpus hearing."

In January 2009, just one year after habeas reform was introduced, the power to license attorneys was transferred from independent bar associations to the Justice Ministry. The move seriously compromised the independence of the criminal defense bar and resulted in the disbarment of numerous independent attorneys, several of whom represented human rights defenders who are currently imprisoned. Ruhiddin Komilov, a well known lawyer who was disbarred in 2009, told Human Rights Watch:

"In the past, I used to take on politically sensitive cases, such as human rights activists and those accused by the government of being extremists. I did this to fulfill my duty as a lawyer to provide a defense to any person who truly needed it. If someone comes to you and asks for your legal help, how can you turn them away?  But the government does not want there to be lawyers who will stand up and speak out about the violation of human rights of their clients; they only want to see lawyers who will close their eyes to systematic violations of their clients' due process rights."

Torture of "Gulom G."
Nodira N. [not her real name], the mother of a teenage boy who was tortured in pre-trial detention in November 2010, told Human Rights Watch that  police had tortured her son to coerce him to sign a confession:

"On November 25, 2010 I saw my son at the police station. I was bringing him food and clothing and was allowed to have 10 minutes with him at about 6 or 7 p.m. I saw a long bruise across his neck left by the gas mask. He told me that several officers had forced him to confess to having committed theft. They put cellophane over his head and then put a gas mask on him. He couldn't breathe and eventually signed the confession. "They beat me and accused me of theft and I had to confess to it," he told me."

Torture of "Bakhtiyor B."
Human Rights Watch interviewed Ziyoda Z. [not her real name], who recently visited her husband Bakhtiyor B., who is serving a 17-year prison sentence for alleged membership in "an illegal religious or extremist organization" and for "attempting to overthrow the constitutional order," among other charges. Ziyoda Z. described her June 2010 visit to her husband:

"When I went to visit him, I started to cry as they brought him out. He was emaciated and I could see that fingernails were missing from two of his fingers and two of his feet. I asked him why his nails were gone. There were guards monitoring our prison visit so at first he just stayed silent. But he looked at me making clear that they had been purposely ripped out. I noticed there were bruises all over his legs, knees, and shoulders. He couldn't sit straight - as if his shoulder had been dislocated.

He found a way to tell me later that sometimes other prisoners are assigned to work with him at the brick factory by prison authorities. These are common criminals, not religious prisoners. He says ...that when he becomes too tired ...he is beaten with shovels [by other prisoners at the instigation of the authorities], then revived with water after he passes out, and beaten again. He told me, "'I will probably not live through this.'"

Torture of "Utkur U."
Human Rights Watch interviewed Rayhon R. [not her real name], wife of Utkur U., currently serving a 16-year prison sentence on similar charges. Utkur U. earlier reported to his wife that prison guards would sometimes hit or kick him in his kidneys or other parts of the body. More recently, however, he told her that the abuse comes at the hands of fellow prisoners, orchestrated by prison authorities. After seeing her husband in July 2010, Rayhon R. told Human Rights Watch:

"Utkur is the only prisoner among his group convicted of "anti-constitutional activity," and [he] is constantly harassed by the eight other prisoners in his cell. He told me how other prisoners made him get into the "thirteenth position." The prisoners were given handcuffs, probably by the guards, and handcuffed him in the shape of a cross on the bars of the prison cell. Using the handcuffs he was forced to stand up in the form of a cross for days. He was not let down even to go to the bathroom and was repeatedly beaten by other prisoners. He told me, "'In order to get myself out of the thirteenth position, I started banging my head against the metal bars until I began to bleed. The other prisoners put a hat on my head to prevent me from doing this. It was only when I agreed not to read namaz [ritual chanting of Islamic prayers] that they set me free.'"

Crackdown on Civil Society and Human Rights Defenders
The Uzbek government has long obstructed the work of domestic and international organizations in the country, refusing to register local independent groups and subjecting activists to harassment and persecution. There is only one active registered independent domestic human rights organization, and those operating without registration are even more vulnerable to government harassment.

Beginning in 2004, the government expelled or forced the closure of numerous international organizations and media outlets, including the Open Society Institute, the BBC, Deutsche Welle, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty,Internews, Freedom House, Counterpart International, the American Bar Association, and many others. None of the organizations that were forced to end their operations have resumed their activities in Uzbekistan.

In the wake of the May 2005 Andijan massacre, Uzbek authorities unleashed a fierce crackdown on domestic civil society groups, imprisoning dozens of human rights defenders, independent journalists, and political activists for speaking out about the Andijan events and calling for accountability for the killings.

Local civil society activism remains severely restricted, and authorities regularly detain and threaten to prosecute human rights defenders, independent journalists, and other activists for their peaceful activism. The authorities do not tolerate dissent of any kind, and frequently place activists under surveillance and subject them to arbitrary detention and de facto house arrest. The authorities also have denied some human rights activists exit visas to prevent them from traveling abroad. Some defenders have felt compelled to stop their work or flee the country, fearing persecution.

The 13 human rights activists known to be in prison for no reason other than legitimate human rights work are: Solijon Abdurakhmanov, Azam Formonov, Nosim Isakov, Gaibullo Jalilov, Alisher Karamatov, Jamshid Karimov, Norboi Kholjigitov, Rasul Khudainasarov, Ganihon Mamatkhanov, Habibulla Okpulatov, Yuldash Rasulov, Dilmurod Saidov, and Akzam Turgunov. Other political and civic activists, including the dissident poetYusuf Jumaev, are likewise serving sentences on politically motivated charges.

Human Rights Watch has received reports from relatives of many imprisoned human rights defenders that they are in poor health, including suffering severe weight loss and losing their teeth due to poor nourishment. Human Rights Watch has credible information that at least seven rights defenders have been ill-treated or subjected to torture in custody.

Authorities routinely target rights defenders already serving long prison sentences with additional punitive measures, such as accusing them of violating prison regulations to make them ineligible for the government's annual amnesty. At least two of them have been forced to serve additional prison time. In September 2009 Habibullo Okpulatov, who was serving a four-year sentence (reduced from six years under amnesty) and was due to be released from prison, was sentenced to an additional three years and eight days  for alleged violations of prison regulations.  Gaibullo Jalilov, who is serving a nine-year sentence, was re-sentenced to 11 years, one month, and five days, on new criminal charges in a flawed proceeding in August 2010, eight months after his initial conviction on bogus charges.

In a recent example of a rights activist convicted on politically motivated criminal charges, the Hamzin District Criminal Court on January 24 convicted Tatyana Dovlatova on fabricated criminal charges of hooliganism (article 277, part 2 of the Uzbek Criminal Code). Authorities did not inform Dovlatova when her final hearing was taking place, denying her the right to make a closing statement in her own defense and convicting her in absentia. She was immediately given an amnesty but her criminal conviction stands.

There are also recent examples of Uzbek authorities' intolerance of public dissent.  On November 27, two weeks after President Karimov gave a speech referring to the existence of a competitive, multi-party system in Uzbekistan, a group of activists formed a new social-democratic political party called The People's Interests. Several days after the group's members met to discuss their policies, police summoned them, questioned them for several hours, and fingerprinted them.

On the morning of December 6, three activists, Abdullo Tojiboi-Ugli, Dmitrii Tikhonov, and Viktoriya Bozhenova, gathered at Mustaqillik (Independence) Square in Tashkent to express human rights concerns. A fourth activist, Vladimir Husainov was present to monitor the protest. Tikhonov described to Human Rights Watch how he and the others were forced to end their protest and that, though they left peacefully, they were arbitrarily detained:

"We went out with our demands. We were able to stand there about 10 minutes, that's it, 10, maybe 15 minutes.  [Then] they told us to leave, so we rolled up our posters and left. They detained us after that.  The people [who detained us] were in civilian clothes and none showed us their documents...  They put us in a car and took us to the Yunusabad district police station." 

The four were held there until 5:30 or 6 p.m. and then transferred to the Yususabad District Court, where they were tried under article 201-1 of the Uzbek administrative code ("violation of the order of holding meetings, rallies, marches or demonstrations"). The court found the activists had violated article 201-1 and fined them between 60 and 70 times the monthly minimum wage (a total fine of approximately US$1,780-$2,080) each. Tikhonov told Human Rights Watch that their right to a fair hearing was violated. He said: "They didn't allow us lawyers, or allow us to review the case materials, or provide us with an interpreter [from Uzbek to Russian]."

Restrictions on Freedom of Expression
Uzbek authorities restrict both freedom of information and the freedom of expression. Websites containing information on sensitive issues or that are critical of the government are routinely blocked within Uzbekistan. The few independent journalists who continue to work in the country do so at great risk and are forced to self-censor due to harassment and threats of imprisonment. Human Rights Watch's expulsion from Uzbekistan should be seen as one of the government's latest attempts to silence critical and independent voices.

Over the last six months, Uzbek authorities persisted in using spurious criminal defamation charges to silence perceived government critics. On October 15, the Voice of America correspondent, Abdumalik Boboev, was convicted of defamation, insult, and preparation or dissemination of materials that threaten public security, and fined approximately US$11,000. In the same month, another journalist, Vladimir Berezovskii, was convicted of similar charges for articles published on the Vesti.uz website.

Boboev told Human Rights Watch: "My only aspiration is to work freely as a journalist, to accurately portray the realities of our society, and not face persecution as a result.  At the very least, I'd like to have confidence in the fact that one won't be killed or punished simply for telling the truth."

Persecution of "Independent" Muslims
The Uzbek authorities' unrelenting, multi-year campaign of arbitrary detention, arrest, torture and incarceration in grossly inhumane conditions, against Muslims who practice their faith outside state controls or belong to unregistered religious organizations, continues unabated.  Since the late 1990s, Human Rights Watch has documented the incarceration of thousands of independent Muslims for nonviolent offenses and the peaceful expression of their religious beliefs.

In November and December 2010, Human Rights Watch interviewed lawyers who represented people in Uzbekistan who had been detained and arrested on charges based on articles 159 ("attempt to overthrow the constitutional order") and 244 ("membership in an illegal religious or extremist organization") of the Uzbek Criminal Code, which are among the charges routinely used to sentence independent Muslims. In 2010 alone, at least 200 people were arrested or convicted on such charges.

One attorney who represented five defendants convicted in March 2010 on such charges told Human Rights Watch:

"A large group of men was detained for allegedly forming an unsanctioned religious organization. One was accused of being a "terrorist" for allegedly attending a Ramadan dinner. Directly following their arrest, I was contacted by some of their families and hired to represent some of the men. The authorities would not give me access to my clients until three days after their arrest! The first day I went to the police department to see my clients I waited for five hours and presented my order [attorney-client retainer agreement] but the guards still would not let me in. I simply kept coming back and refused to leave the building until they let me in and I finally got inside after three days - after the habeas corpus hearing approving their detention for a five-month period had occurred.

I undressed one of my clients and realized he had been beaten in places where wounds were less likely to show up. He was shaking and told me that officers had hit him with rubber sticks (dubinki) on the top of his head and hit his legs with plastic water bottles. I later heard that all the men in the group had been treated this way."

Police also routinely fail to notify families of religious detainees of their relatives' whereabouts. Refusing to acknowledge the detention of an individual or reveal the whereabouts of a person who has been deprived of liberty constitutes an enforced disappearance under international law, a serious human rights violation subject to criminal prosecution.

Umida U. [not her real name] told Human Rights Watch that she spent five days searching for her sons after they were detained in Karshi in October 2010:

"I looked for them myself.... First I visited the hospital and also the morgue .... We looked everywhere. Then we went to the police... "They're not here. Your sons aren't here," they said. I went to the SNB [National Security Service]. They said my sons weren't there. Then after five days, was there [at the SNB] crying and started to argue with them, and then they told me that my sons were at the city police station."

In a disturbing trend prisoners charged with "religious extremism" also seem to be targeted by prison authorities, who try to keep them incarcerated beyond their original sentences. The authorities frequently initiate new criminal proceedings for alleged violations of prison regulations, such as failure to shave their beards or disobeying orders of prison staff. Prisoners subjected to such proceedings are not afforded adequate due process rights and can easily end up with their prison sentences extended by three years or more.

Lack of Accountability for the Andijan Massacre
Since May 13, 2005, when government forces killed hundreds of mostly peaceful protestors who had gathered in Bobur square in Andijan to voice discontent about growing poverty and government repression, Human Rights Watch has  persistently called for accountability and justice for the victims. To date, however, no one has been held accountable for the victims' deaths, nor have the circumstances surrounding the massacre been clarified.

For close to six years, the Uzbek government has adamantly rejected numerous and repeated calls for an independent international inquiry into the Andijan events.

Furthermore, the authorities persist in persecuting anyone they suspect of having witnessed the atrocities. Local authorities intimidate and harass families of Andijan survivors who have sought refuge abroad. Police subject them to constant surveillance, call them for questioning, and have threatened them with criminal charges or home confiscation. School officials also publicly humiliate refugees' children.

Local authorities pressure those who fled the massacre and ensuing crackdown to return to Uzbekistan, giving relatives assurances that no harm will come to them. Yet, when Diloram Abdukodirova, a refugee who decided to return to Uzbekistan, did so in January 2010, she was promptly detained. On April 30, Abdukodirova was sentenced to 10 years and two months in prison for illegal border crossing and anti-constitutional activity. Abdukodirova appeared at one court hearing with bruises on her face, indicating possible ill-treatment in custody.