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Summary

Three years ago, the government of Uzbekistan took the important step of issuing an invitation to the United Nations (U.N.) Special Rapporteur on torture and other cruel, inhuman degrading treatment or punishment, the first government of the five Central Asian states to do so.¹ The Special Rapporteur’s long-awaited fact-finding visit in late 2002 represented a major development in torture reform efforts and raised significant hopes that it would trigger fundamental changes toward eradicating the use of torture in Uzbekistan. His subsequent report, issued in February 2003, detailed Uzbekistan’s pervasive torture problem, which he characterized as “systematic,” and made twenty-two recommendations for combating it. ²

Two years later the government has taken a few halting steps toward torture reform, including seminars, technical education, outreach to the diplomatic community, engagement with select human rights activists, and technical changes to regulations on paper. While welcome, these efforts have not resulted in a fundamental change in the systematic use of torture or in policies and practices that could effectively combat it.

Nor do these measures mark substantial progress on implementing the recommendations made in the Special Rapporteur’s report. Significantly, the government has shown little will to do so or even to acknowledge the conclusions in the report. Most strikingly, the government has not taken meaningful steps on two of the Special Rapporteur’s key recommendations: making a clear public statement condemning torture and declaring an end to the culture of impunity, and enacting a law providing for and implementing habeas corpus. Finally, the failure to reform is perhaps most compellingly evidenced by continuing serious, credible allegations of torture by law enforcement officials during investigations, pre-trial custody, and in prisons, made by detainees, their relatives, and defense attorneys.

This briefing paper assesses changes in law and in practice in the areas covered by many of the Special Rapporteur’s twenty-two recommendations. It is based on numerous interviews with former detainees, detainees’ relatives, defense lawyers, and human rights defenders conducted in the past year, as well as government reports and communications with government officials.