In a move that defies logic, EU foreign ministers this week scrapped the EU's one remaining sanction against Uzbekistan - a purely symbolic embargo on arms sales - despite Tashkent's defiance of the human-rights criteria the EU had set for its lifting.
Illogical it may have been, but the move was not unexpected. Extending the embargo would have required the agreement of all 27 member states, and it was well-known that some EU governments, notably Germany, had long opposed sanctions as policy tools.
Though there has never been any known arms trade between the EU and Uzbekistan, the symbolism of the embargo was important: it was imposed because the government had massacred hundreds of people in 2005, most of them unarmed civilians. And while the last substantive sanction - a visa ban on eight government officials - was effectively dropped in October 2008, the arms embargo at least maintained a framework for high-level EU engagement and scrutiny of Tashkent's human-rights record.
In lifting the embargo, EU ministers failed to stay true to the human-rights criteria that the EU has formulated for Tashkent, leaving in the lurch more than a dozen activists imprisoned on politically motivated charges. Among them is one - Dilmurod Saidov, a journalist and human-rights defender - arrested after the EU's previous review of its Uzbekistan policy. He was sentenced on 30 July to 12-and-a-half years in prison.
To justify the indefensible, EU foreign ministers resorted to the surreal by praising what they termed "positive steps" by the Uzbek government, including its participation in a "structured human-rights dialogue" with the EU, ratification of international conventions prohibiting child labour, and the introduction of habeas corpus. Yet, apart from the human-rights dialogue - isolated annual talks whose content and outcome remain obscure and appear to have no bearing on the overall relationship with Uzbekistan - none of these steps cited by the EU took place in the past year.
In private conversations, EU diplomats readily acknowledge that, in truth, the situation continues to deteriorate. Over the past year, Uzbek activists have been attacked and arrested, a Human Rights Watch research consultant has been banned and deported, lawyers who have taken on ‘political' cases have had their licences revoked, and there have been credible reports of torture and ill-treatment in custody, including at least one suspicious death. The list goes on.
By failing to be honest and acknowledge this harsh reality, by failing to insist on the human-rights improvements it has repeatedly called for, the EU is effectively abandoning any credible effort to achieve human-rights progress through its Uzbekistan policy.
The detrimental effect should not be underestimated. It tells repressive leaders around the world that the EU is not serious when it urges rights reform, that intransigence pays off because the EU will ultimately back down.
It also tells victims of government abuse that they cannot count on the EU to stand up in their defence, even when they suffer repression solely because they had the courage to promote the very values the EU purports to stand for.
Veronika Szente Goldston is Human Rights Watch's advocacy director for Europe and Central Asia.
