Starting 2022, the farm land lease agreements will be terminated with those farms which did not develop multifunctional operations. Farmers who used their land inefficiently may lose it. Yuliy Yusupov, an independent expert in economics, comments on the latest decree on agriculture.
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Despite Turkmenistan’s international commitments to suppress the use of forced or compulsory labor in all its forms, in 2017 the government continued to mobilize tens of thousands of civil servants to pick cotton under threat of dismissal. For the first time in a decade, the authorities have also mobilized masses of children to pick cotton
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In Tashkent, female employees of health clinics, schools, and kindergartens are forced to clean in low-income houses in the Sergeli district for free. Nurses complain that otherwise they are threatened with dismissal and withholding from their wages.
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On January 20, 2018 at 3 p.m. at the monument of Urkuya Saliyeva (at the crossing of Chui ave. and Sovetskaya street) young leaders-volunteers of the “Human Rights Movement: Bir Duino Kyrgyzstan” held a peaceful march in honor of the protection of women’s rights in Kyrgyzstan. The purpose of this march was a vivid demonstration of disagreement between young people and unfair situations happening at the moment in the country: early marriages, bride kidnapping, polygamy, pedophilia, family and sexual violence, harassment at work, slavery and human trafficking. This action was also timed to coincide with the celebration of the 70th anniversary of the UN Universal Declaration of Human Rights and the International Women’s March, which was held around the world on January 20-21, 2018.
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As the Kazakh government hosted high-profile international events, including EXPO 2017, an annual international exhibition, and several rounds of Syria peace talks, its human rights record further deteriorated. Authorities suppressed independent trade union activity and continued to target government critics, including journalists, with politically motivated criminal charges and other harassment. Several activists and union leaders remain wrongfully imprisoned. The government is considering legislative amendments that appear to propose even further restrictions on freedom of religion. Impunity for torture and ill-treatment in detention persist.
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The 2017 presidential election was won by Sooronbai Jeenbekov and marked the second time since independence in 1991 that Kyrgyzstan experienced a peaceful transfer of presidential power. International observers found the election to be competitive and orderly, but noted concerns about abuse of public resources, pressure on voters, and vote buying. Prior to the election, authorities banned public assemblies in central Bishkek and introduced restrictions on domestic election monitors, such as limiting the number of civil society observers per polling station to one.
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In the year-and-a-half since Uzbekistan’s President Shavkat Mirziyoyev assumed power following the death of his predecessor, Islam Karimov, he has taken some steps to improve the country’s abysmal human rights record, such as releasing some political prisoners, relaxing certain restrictions on free expression, removing citizens from the security services’ notorious “black list,” and increasing accountability of government institutions to the citizenry.
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Turkmenistan remains one of the world’s most closed and oppressively governed countries. President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov and his associates control all aspects of public life. Elections extended Berdymukhamedov’s presidential term for another seven years.
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Tajikistan’s human rights record worsened further in 2017, as authorities deepened a severe, widespread crackdown on free expression and association, peaceful political opposition activity, the independent legal profession, and the independent exercise of religious faith.
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French TV airs two-hour documentary about the Uzbek cotton industry On November 28, the French TV channel France 2, broadcast a two-hour documentary about international business dealings in the cotton industry, including insights into the dysfunctional Uzbek cotton sector. The French journalist, Sandrine Rigaud, travelled to Uzbekistan, Bangladesh and India to investigate the dark side of the…
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