On August 1, 2005, President Karimov announced, through a presidential decree, that the abolition of the death penalty was planned for January 1, 2008. The FIDH welcomes that decision but deeply regrets that this decree will not enter into force immediately. It does not provide for a moratorium on executions and will not prevent further condemnations to death until January 1, 2008.
The FIDH welcomes that decision but deeply regrets that this decree will not enter into force immediately. It does not provide for a moratorium on executions and will not prevent further condemnations to death until January 1, 2008.
The report concludes that the Uzbek authorities are responsible of serious and systematic human rights violations in the framework of the administration of criminal justice.
The rights of those arrested are systematically violated. They often lack any access to a lawyer during their pre-trial detention, their families are not informed and torture is used in order to extort confessions, which often serve as a basis for their condemnation.
Authorities refused to cooperate with the FIDH’s mission. All the official meetings requested by the FIDH were denied. Experts were put « put on their guard» by staff at the Uzbekistan embassy in France threatening that their visas would not be recognised and that they would be turned back at the airport arrivals. The FIDH was not allowed to visit any detention place.