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It is critical for you as the OSCE’s authoritative spokesperson on media freedoms to send a strong message to the Uzbek government that it is failing in its OSCE obligations, and that you view this as a key factor that will undermine the validity of the forthcoming elections. This will also send a strong message to other institutions that are Uzbekistan’s key interlocutors that the state of media freedoms in Uzbekistan is unacceptable and completely incompatible with conditions for free and fair elections.

Dear Mr. Haraszti,

Human Rights Watch highly values the important contribution your work is making toward the development of media freedoms in the OSCE region. We are writing to you to urge you to issue a public statement deploring the state of media freedoms in Uzbekistan during this critical pre-election period.

Regrettably, little has changed since the publication of the Representative’s thorough and accurate 2002 report on media freedoms in Uzbekistan. Media in Uzbekistan operate under tight government restrictions. Freedom of the press is severely limited by an unofficial censorship regime in which critical ideas are excised from publications, and journalists are pressured not to write critically. No independent local media outlets exist.

Through our Tashkent office, Human Rights Watch has documented disturbing incidents of government harassment of independent journalists and continuing limitations on the operation of local media. We have also observed that as the Uzbek government has had to face diplomatic and financial consequences for its poor human rights record, it has closed or threatened to close key media and civil society institutions that engage in reporting on political, economic, and security issues in Uzbekistan. In 2003 the government denied reaccreditation to the Institute for War and Peace Reporting, conditioning reaccreditation on the organization’s “ceasing to fund” the director of its Tashkent branch. The government has refused to register the International Crisis Group, in 2003 detained one of the organization’s researchers in Uzbekistan, and now refuses to issue visas to its staff. In September 2004, the government suspended the work of Internews-Uzbekistan and audited the Tashkent office of Internews-International.

The government stifles other forms of critical speech, particularly related to public assembly. It arbitrarily arrests opposition leaders, places potential demonstrators under temporary house arrest to prevent them from reaching protest sites, and commits acts of physical violence to intimidate would-be demonstrators.

The OSCE has emphasized the crucial role of media freedoms in guaranteeing free and fair elections. Uzbek citizens will go to the polls on December 26 to vote for members of parliament, but they will have been utterly deprived of open, public debate about the candidates, the process, and the key issues facing the country.

It is critical for you as the OSCE’s authoritative spokesperson on media freedoms to send a strong message to the Uzbek government that it is failing in its OSCE obligations, and that you view this as a key factor that will undermine the validity of the forthcoming elections. This will also send a strong message to other institutions that are Uzbekistan’s key interlocutors that the state of media freedoms in Uzbekistan is unacceptable and completely incompatible with conditions for free and fair elections.

We thank you for your attention to the concerns in this letter.

Sincerely,

Holly Cartner
Executive Director
Europe and Central Asia division

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