Benchmarks for Progress in Human Rights that the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) Should Set for the Uzbe

The EBRD will hold its 2003 annual meeting in Tashkent, Uzbekistan, a country with an atrocious human rights record that makes it a poor symbol for the Bank's commitment to "fundamental principles of multiparty democracy, the rule of law, respect for human rights and market economics." On May 16, 2002, more than fifty nongovernmental organizations from twenty-four of the EBRD shareholder countries sent a letter to EBRD President Jean Lemierre, calling for the Bank to insist on concrete progress in human rights before next year's annual meeting.