Radio Ozodlik has reported that seven children from 3 to 6 years old were incorrectly vaccinated while the nurse responsible for conducting preventive vaccinations was sent to pick cotton.
As monitored by the International Labour Organisation (ILO), almost all citizens of Uzbekistan involved in cotton-picking this year have worked on the fields as volunteers, while the country has made titanic efforts to eradicate forced labour. However, the findings of independent human rights activists contravene the official data.
The Laboratory on Labour Rights, organised by the International Labour Rights Monitoring Mission in Central Asia as part of the Bir Duino International Festival of Human Rights Documentary Films, with participation of representatives of independent trade union and human rights organisations from Belarus, Germany, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Norway, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, Uzbekistan and the USA
Two farmers from the village of Uzbekistan in the Akkurgan district of the Tashkent region, 39-year-old Sherali Toshiboev and 54-year-old Erkin Maripov, were arrested for not repaying loans for cotton. Erkin Maripov was released on November 24 after his family repaid part of the loan. Sherali Toshiboev remains in custody.
One of the soldiers told Ozodlik that despite the lack of cotton in the fields, ten thousand soldiers of the Uzbek Armed Forces are picking cotton in the Akaltyn district of the Syrdarya region. An employee of the regional administration later confirmed this information
Conscripts have been harvesting the last of the cotton in at least two regions in Turkmenistan, as low pay and freezing weather put off hired laborers.
Conscripts were sent to pick cotton in several districts in the southeast Mary region at the end of November. They wore military uniform and travelled to the fields in army Ural and Kamaz trucks.
Relatives of Sanjar Baratov, a 33-year-old farmer from the Jizzakh region in Uzbekistan, said that he took his own life because he felt desperate after Enforcement Bureau officers confiscated his property for failure to pay off a bank loan.
On behalf of its members the BKDP Executive Committee expresses its deep indignation at continuing attacks of the authorities of Kazakhstan on the rights and freedoms of workers and our brothers and sisters from independent trade unions of Kazakhstan. The attacks are accompanied by reprisals, prosecutions, and threats to use physical violence against leaders and activists of the Confederation of Independent Trade Unions of the Republic of Kazakhstan (KNPRK) which recently has been unlawfully dissolved by the authorities.
Skyting av streikende arbeidere, angrep på journalister og statsdrevet slavearbeid. Diktaturene i Sentral-Asia plager bokstavelig talt livet av egen befolkning – til øredøvende stillhet.
On October the 22nd 2018, the Pan-European Regional Council (PERC) Executive Committee adopted a recommendation to the ITUC General Council that the membership of the Federation of Trade Unions of Republics of Kazakhstan (FPRK) must be suspended.