Translator’s Note: Translated from Jamil’s post (RUS).

On March 14, 2011, Mukhiddin Khojimuradov suggested to his compatriots Khairulla and Sunatullo Yuldashevs from Chinaz region of Tashkent oblast that they move to Kazakhstan’s city of Turkestan, where they could earn decent money. When the four young men reached the place, the only job they were offered was at the car washing station; their employer refused to pay for their labor, reports the Initiative group of independent rights activists of Uzbekistan (IGIRAU). They never signed contracts and their passports had been taken away; they had effectively become slaves, who were constantly beaten and forced to work each day from 7am to 10pm.

The four men all used to sleep in a small room with only one metal bed on the concrete floor. One month later, Sunnatullo fell ill, but their employer’s son (who had previously been charged for murder and was now in control of the slaves’ work) forced him to pledge that he would send another three Uzbeks in return for his own freedom. With no other option left, Sunnatullo and was released. According to Yuldashevs’ sister Gulnoza, the other three were released three weeks later. The four men have since spoken about dozens of other deceived countrymen from Chinaz, who had been recruited by the above-mentioned Mukhiddin Khojimuradov and were enslaved in Kazakhstan.

In the beginning of May 2011, Gulnoza, a member of the Yuldashev family, asked the Chinaz department of the National Security Council for help. The officer named Sukhrob, gave Gulnoza a dictaphone so she could record all her talks with militia, prosecutor, judges, the region’s local authorities and healthcare workers. She managed to do both audio and video recordings and passed everything to them. IGIRAU reports that Gulnoza appealed to Gen. Shavkat Ismailov of the Chinaz regional militia office, the prosecutor of Chinaz region Gairat Mukhamedov, and local authorities’ representative Davron Teshaboev. However, instead of investigating the issue, they started bullying the young woman. The district militiaman Nurjan Sadirov even threatened to exterminate her family if she dared to spread information about the practice of recruiting and enslaving people in Kazakhstan.

According to Surat Ikramov, the chairman of IGIRAU, it all became clear that every official in Chinaz has their interest or share in the recruiting business. They actually receive monetary dividends, and file such crimes under article 183 of the administrative code of RepUz. By May 2011, Gulnoza had already been threatened by the Investigator of the Department of Internal Affairs of Tashkent Akrom Mirsodykov.

Gulnoza believes that the main executor of the fabricated court case was the judge of the Chinaz rayon Criminal Court, B.D. Miralimov, who had immediately demanded that she withdrew all her appeals. The judge destroyed all the documents in front of her and threw them in her face. Right activist Surat Ikramov remarked:

“Corrupt security forces, judges and local authorities keep supporting illegal recruitment of Chinaz rayon’s citizens abroad. As for the victim Sunnatulla Yuldashev, he had to spend nine months in hospital.”

SIMILAR TOPICS:

neweurasia “Трудовая миграция и детский труд: взгляд из Бухары”

neweurasia “Трудовые мигранты из Узбекистана сообщают о своем рабском положении”

neweurasia “Трудовая миграция: граждане Хорезмской области все чаще обращаются за помощью”

The National Journalism Prize Oltin Qalam VII (Golden Pen) gathers young talented journalists in Tashkent, Uzbekistan. The contest’s aim: to award the best achievements in print, television, radio, Internet and press journalism. Ministries, authorities and mass media partake in the event – even the UN, UNESCO and the World Bank participate and give their own awards.

About the awards, Uzbekistan National News Agency said:

“One of the complimentary awards will go for the best article devoted to 2012, the Year of Family.”

UzDaily says:

“The competition, which was established on initiative of the Uzbek President, is dedicated to the World Press Freedom Day.”

Celebrating press freedom… in Uzbekistan… seriously?

The media in this Central Asian country is very far from anything free, regardless of the image this Oltin Qalam contests portrays. In 2011, the media rights NGO Reporters Without Borders classified Uzbekistan as an “Enemy of The Internet”. On May 3rd, 2011, World Press Freedom Day, the Office of the United States Press Secretary of the Department of State said:

“Countries such as Belarus, Burma, Cuba, Eritrea, Libya, North Korea, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan also continue to be notoriously repressive of press freedoms.”

The real media issue at heart is that though the contest claims to be inspired by free media ideals – there is no real press freedom in Uzbekistan.

Is the aim of this Oltin Qalam VII competition to prove that Uzbekistan is truly moving forward with the twised relationship it has with media today, in hopes to become better – to become more accepting of true journalism, to make the environment more free and welcoming to political commentary and opinions that government would find unfavorable? By hosting this competition, are Uzbek officials proposing they can congregate an international press competition with honesty and transparency?

Even thought it’s an idea that grasps positive hope, evidence of the ongoing treatment of media would tell us that no – this likely is not the case.

neweurasia’s Avicenna’s post “Central Asia is a totally free-press-free-zone “ is about last year’s Oltin Qalam competition results. Here’s a bit of what Avicenna had to say on May 3rd, 2011:

“Today is World Press Freedom Day celebrated everywhere but in totalitarian countries. In Uzbekistan journalist community of those affiliated with official and foreign accredited mass-media enjoyed the national Oltin Qalam (Uzbek, Golden pen) award ceremony in Tashkent.”

“While the major award of the event went to a local media-tycoon Firdavs Abdukhalikov, whose affiliation with mass-media limits with owning tabloids and private TV channels and chairing at the National Association of Electronic Mass Media (NAESMI), and has nothing to do with journalism, Freedom House released its Freedom of the Press 2011 report that identifies the greatest threats to independent media in 196 countries and territories.”

“It was released on May 2 as part of the UNESCO World Press Freedom Day celebration in Washington, D.C. According to the website of Freedom House, “the report shows that global media freedom has reached a new low point, contributing to an environment in which only one in every six people live in countries with a Free press.””

About the contest, UzDaily also says:

“It is also open for press services of the state and nongovernmental establishments.”

Really? It would be very interesting to see how many independent media-makers will be involved in the contest, in a fair and just way. Will a nongovernmental media establishment win this year? I guess we’ll just have to wait for the results to be announced on World Press Freedom Day 2012 to find out.

Please, Uzbekistan, don’t ruin a lovely day for journalists who work hard for a free and open press – especially in countries that are far from being free – by awarding one of your undeserving buddies.

See below: VII International National Competition for Journalists, Uzbekistan – 2012

“And why beholdest thou the mote that is in thy brother’s eye, but considerest not the beam that is in thy own eye?”
Matthew 7:3

Karimov knocks out Rahmon?

Official Uzbek media keep downgrading Tajikistan’s Emomali Rahmon regime by reprinting online critical articles written by journalists who are, in fact, perfect “Uzbek state enemies.”

Nowadays, apart from finding disadvantages and ‘assisting’ in postponing the construction of the Roghun project in Tajikistan, Uzbek media representatives decided to impose themselves as ready-to-analyze independent online sources on the search for as much information as possible that tells of the Rahmon’s regime’s failures and lies.

One of them, Tashkentskaya Pravda (Tashkent Truth) allowed itself to publish an article from Paruskg.info website, which refers to Wikileaks information, entitled, “Apple Does Not Fall Far From The Tree.”

Shamsullo Gulov, author of the ‘kompromat’ starts with calling Wikileaks a “famous web site” that gives opinions of U.S. State Department employees regarding Rahmon’s family seizing control over main industrial and financial facilities in the counrty. Later on, the author says that the information provided by Wikileaks are “concrete facts.”

Well, first of all, the fact of using Wikileaks as a source of information is something out of reality for Uzbek media since Wikileaks itself, based on American diplomatic cables, called Karimov an “authoritarian leader” and linked his regime with the Uzbek mafia.

Secondly, while condemning the Rahmons social status and its control over main businesses in Tajikistan, the author forgets about one very important detail: Gulnara and Lola Karimov are very much in charge of sharing the same control over businesses in Uzbekistan, which was also rightfully revealed by American diplomats’ cables that were published by Wikileaks. One of the examples is Gulnara’s control over back then one of the most influential and powerful companies, Zeromax.

One by one, with peculiar sarcasm the author ‘discloses’ the facts that “Princess Tahmina,” Rahmon’s daughter, controls companies that are in charge of agricultural equipment import, as well as has her share in construction business.

“All these operations let her renew her motorpool more often than her lingerie collection,” an Uzbek journalist says, with not-well-hidden jealousy.

Here is a perfect moment to recall Gulnara Karimova’s ninth-richest status in the list of the wealthiest individuals of Switzerland.

Tajik No 2 — Rustam Rahmon, President’s son is Macho, President of the Tajik Football Federation and a member of the Asian Olympic Committee. He loves spending his time in brothels and casino’s affected by drugs. To the Uzbek journalist it is absurd to have a President’s child be so irresponsible and public at the same time — Gulnora should speak, right?

Shamsullo Gulov emphasizes that this situation happens in a country that has a 2.7 billion external debt and where 63% of the population (75% in reality, the author claims) is living below the poverty line with an average salary of $100. Probably Mr. Gulov forgot about the 5 billion external debt of Uzbekistan, and the $70-120 salary for average Uzbeks.

The author resumes his ‘masterpiece’ with a claim that while 1.5 million Tajik migrant workers work abroad to keep the population alive, their leader and his family live a posh life. By the way, the statistics are taken from Freedom House, another organization that was kicked out of Uzbekistan after the tragic events in Andijan, and whose reports on Uzbekistan are very critical of the human rights situation and, thus, are always very negatively commented on by the dictatorship regime.

To mention, according to official statistics from Russia’s Interfax Financial Market edition, among 10 million foreigners who migrated to Russia since January 2011, citizens of Uzbekistan make up to 14% of them (1.4 million).

To this I have nothing else to add but: “Why do you look at the speck that is in your brother’s eye, but do not notice the log that is in your own eye?” Actually, Karimov and Rahmon are not ‘brothers’ anymore. Not in this Presidential life.

Below: “Apple Does Not Fall Far From The Tree” by Tashkentskaya Pravda, January 18, 2012.

Regarding the title, those of you familiar with political Islam shall understand the reference to طاغوت (taghut), an Arabic Islamic term meaning “to cross the limits, overstep boundaries” or “to rebel” vis-à-vis divine authority. Traditionally a term connoting idolatry, it is mentioned in the politically significant Qur’anic verse 4:76 (which Schwartz and I quote in the final part of the series). During the medieval period, it has was used by Muslims to describe the rampaging Mongol khans and their vassals. Today, in contemporary Islamic political theory, it has come to be used to describe dictatorships, i.e., as violating the will of God.

You can read the piece here: http://www.fairobserver.com/article/life-after-taghut

“The kids of our family, some of whose parents are not here with them in the U.S. and who became vistims of the Uzbek regime’s prosecution for being my relatives, are the ones trying to bring international attention to this problem,” Bakhodir Choriyev, leader of Birdamlik who currently resides in the United States, told neweurasia.

As a result, some kids are either without one parent or both parents — their relatives are deprived from their right to move freely and come to the U.S. where they have residence permits (the so-called Green Cards).

“This is the first protest in the series but not the last,” says Choriev. “We will continue our protests and call our Uzbek citizens, who are abroad, to occupy Uzbek embassies in countries of their residence! By doing this we can inform the world and publicity in developed democratic countries about horrible dictatorship regime in Uzbekistan, about President Karimov’s intolerance towards freedom of speech and political rights of the people of Uzbekistan!”

Photos provided by Bakhodir Choriev.

Second change: Newspapers that belong to official governmental agencies are now 30% more expensive than in 2011.

Of course, there are explanations justified enough to be acceptable. But, I am going to use this opportunity to think the way a regular reader presumably would.

I believe that the first change aims to make editions ‘more informative and interesting’ to their readers. The issue of “the bigger does not automatically mean the better” does not really matter to Uzbek media managers.

For the second change, raise in the price, I would guess that since not so many people read newspapers that are published in Uzbekistan (we will get back to this point later in this post), the owners, e.g. Parliament, Uzbek government, local municipalities, realized that the way to survive is to bring the prices up: those who buy [and not necessarily read] these newspapers will anyways be obliged to keep buying them. Among them are: schools, universities, governmental or government-affiliated establishments.

Getting back to the question whether ordinary people will ‘suffer’ from the raise in the price: according to official statistics brought by Uzmetronom, with a population of almost 30 million people, a circulation of 15-30 thousand is a huge success. There are some newspapers that are only of 1.5-2 thousand copies each.

The website compares these numbers to the 80th of the XX century — back then Uzbek SSR newspaper “Sovet Ozbekistoni” (“Soviet Uzbekistan”) had a circulation of million copies per issue. “Pravda Vostoka” (“Oriental Truth”) had 200 thousand copies.

Nowadays, “Pravda Vostoka’s” circulation is 15,100-15,500 copies. “Darakchi” tabloid, one of the most popular ‘bestsellers’, has a circulation of less than 29 thousand copies. Russian “Argumenty i Fakty” that has a circulation of almost 2,5 million copies in Russia itself, is represented by 26,520 thousand copies in Uzbekistan.

Uzmetronom called its news about the raise in the price “A Raise of Scrap Papers Price.” Well, I totally agree with it.

Photo courtesy (c) neweurasia.

Uzbekistan President’s heartfelt greetings were delivered to Hillary Clinton, U.S. Secretary of State, Barack Obama, U.S. President, Christian Wulff, President of the Federal Republic of Germany, Angela Merkel, Chancellor of the Federal Republic of Germany, Hu Jintao, President of the People’s Republic of China, Vladimir Putin, Prime Minister of the Russian Federation, Dmitry Medvedev, President of the Russian Federation, Ivan Gasparovic, President the Slovak Republic, and Raul Modesto Castro Ruz, Chairman of State Council and Council of Ministers of the Republic of Cuba.

Even though the latter two were not about the New Years coming, the date of when they were sent qualify them as a part of the Uzbek President’s ‘congratulatory mood’ and overall emphasis on relations with particular countries.

The most important thing in this torrent of messages by Karimov is that out of all countries represented, U.S., Russia, China and Germany are main strategic partners of Uzbekistan. Greetings to Slovakian President are President’s diplomatic protocol duty.

What the heck is Cuba doing on this ‘exclusive list’ of recipients?

President of the Republic of Uzbekistan Islam Karimov has sent a congratulatory note to Raul Modesto Castro Ruz, Chairman of State Council and Council of Ministers of the Republic of Cuba, on the national holiday of that country – Cuba Liberation Day,
the President’s press-service reported.

Moreover, the head of Uzbekistan “wished a kind health and every success to Raul Modesto Castro Ruz, along with peace and prosperity to the entire people of Cuba.”

Is this special attention to Cuba something that differentiates Uzbekistan as a country with multi-vector political course? Or maybe this is just to show others how balled the country is: to put odious Cuban regime leader in one row with the United States and Germany? Or it is just a nice continuation of the Russian-China-Anti-Western-Axis to signal to them that this is how we, Uzbeks, treat our Caribbean partners via its Embassy in Moscow (there’s no permanent Cuban representation in Uzbekistan), and that speculations about democracy by Uzbek government are worth sacrificing for a strong Cuban fidelity?

Cuba and Uzbekistan have good relations on international arena in the part of supporting each other in, for instance, United Nations and its agencies — both have not voted against each other: neither when Western countries try to impose additional sanctions on Cuba, nor when they did the same on Uzbekistan after a bloody suppression of the unrest in 2005 in Andijan.

Thus, political partnership of the two dictatorship regimes are important to be revived with such messages back and forth from time to time — how will the U.S. and its allies react to that, or while security cooperation issue raise will it just ignore and let Uzbek leader play his strategic game to the end, that remains unclear.

Author mentions about 15 people killed in riots, as well as emphasizes that use of force “will make the wound deeper.”

Experts, some of whom see Ablyazov’s hand in this, and of course through Respublika nespaper, Kanal+ TV channel and Svoboda Slova (Freedom of Speech). Moreover, the cheesy “how-were-rally-participants-able-to-sustain-for-seven-months?” argument was also used to emphasize Ablyazov’s and Rakhat Aliyev’s participation.

To make this short, experts agree with the fact that Kazakhstan is on the threshold of a threat with symptoms of the Arab Spring. They develop it: social networks were used to gather people, while security services found external ties to the riot activists.

“Here comes the question: Who was dissatisfied by stability in Kazakhstan, and by its president Nazarbayev, who built up pretty equal relations in all geopolitical dimension?” the author, Oleg Stolpovsky wonders.

The fact that this publication is the first even in Uzbek press could have a message with it — the Uzbek censorship guys got sanctions to make Nazarbayev’s reputation of a successful leader and a winner in the Karimov vs. Nazarbayev struggle for leadership, drawn in the blood of revolutionaries. To the level where Karimov stands himself.

Even though this short note is given in the end of the magazine, that is either something editor had not noticed and, relying on his staffers who know nithing but copy-pasting articles from other media, approved it for publication, or the responsible person did not find it as threatening national cyber-security.

On one hand, the author explains why using proxy servers is such a popular phenomenon — people around the world use those IT-tools to make sure their private info is not kept even after their visits to this or that page.

On the other hand, Uzbekistan is a country that practices tough censorship and those who want to read banned information have to either use proxy servers, or have a satellite internet connection that is not filtered by Uzbektelecom, a state-owned telecommunication company.

One of the ways to avoid banning is to use HideMyAss proxy web site. Other two are TOR and Guardster.

To note, this would probably become one of the notes/articles published by Darakchi tabloid and forgotten right after being read if not Uzmetronom.com’s mention, which highlighted that proxy-servers in Uzbekistan are basically used to access banned web sites. Now these proxy tools are in jeopardy to be banned by internet service providers that execute orders of Uzbektelecom and security services responsible for Uzbekistan’s ‘cyberspace.’

Due to the reports about Uzmetronom.com’s Sergey Ezhkov’s ties to security services of Uzbekistan, this might bring to reprimands or even more serious sanctions towards the author of the note and editors of Darakchi. In June, 2011, Novyi Vek newspaper published an article about a biohumus and how a young businessman Dilshod Usmanov implemented the knowledge of his dad into the development of the worms usage to enrich the soil.

The problem was that Dilshod’s father is a well-known in Uzbekistan Doctor of natural sciences and a businessman, who is nowadays in prison for allegedly not sharing the profit with the Karimov regime.

Pavel Kravets, author of that article in Novyi Vek newspaper, was later on summoned by editor-in-chief Valeriy Niyazov and asked to sing papers on leaving the organization by his own will.

Darakchi #50 of December 15, 2011

Moreover, nobody in the government dares to even think about discussing real human rights situation in the Uzbekistan — “Interests of a human being are priority over anything,” or “Uzbekistan has ratified all six UN conventions on human rights” is the classic response to any sort of concerns regarding independent reports on human rights violations.

The article claims that the National Human Rights Center had participated in the expertise of more than 100 bills and 10 National plans of actions in the field of human rights.

The event, entitled “International treaties and Uzbekistan’s experience in the process of prefectioning of the national human rights and freedoms system,” became the main concluding event in the “Welcome-to-Uzbekistan-the-land-of-happiness-and-human-rights-protection” propaganda program for 2011.

To make the event seem legit, Mr. Saidov invited Ombudsman from Slovenia, representatives from the Danish Institute for Human Rights, National Center for Human Rights of Slovakia, Scottish Human Rights Commission, who talked about the role of human rights and the way Uzbekistan deals with “every single case of human rights violations.”

There were even cases when some banned web sites of information agencies were accessible to people without using proxy servers/web sites. neweurasia could not confirm this, but trusts the sources who informed about the temporary access changes.

“All the reports and supporting materials of the event will be published and distributed among high schools, universities and makhallas. This will be another step in informing people about the efforts the Uzbek government takes to make sure human rights is a priority in its policymaking. But, of course, this all is to show-off how ‘developed’ in this field we are, while in fact we are not,” the National Human Rights Center staffer who asked to be unnamed, told neweurasia.

“At our events, I saw people who were sceptical about the information we provide, but they remained silent only because they did not want troubles. People in the HuanRights Center know that too, but a status and fear for the future of their own and their families keep them in this perfectly managed system of praises and lies,” he said.

Halq So'zi, #243 of December 16, 2011