Uzbekistan: ex-political prisoner denied registration of NGO

On September 23, the leader of the human rights organization Human Rights House, Agzam Turgunov, along with other founders, filed a lawsuit against the Ministry of Justice in response to the eighth refusal to officially register the nongovernmental organization, issued on August 28, 2021.

International Partnership for Human Rights ”(IPHR, Belgium) and the Association for Human Rights in Central Asia (AHRCA, France) once again recorded the fact that the Uzbek authorities do not fulfill their obligations to form a civil society in the country.

In an official letter, the Justice Ministry confirmed the rejection of the registration request to former political prisoner Turgunov. The reason was the alleged failure to provide two copies of the charter and a receipt confirming the payment of a mandatory state fee. Turgunov and his lawyer were quite surprised by this explanation because they provided all the necessary documents and a billing statement.

According to IPHR and AHRCA, the Justice Department’s arguments are inconclusive and unsubstantiated and indicate that registration requests are being rejected for politically motivated reasons.

“Unfortunately, we are once again seeing an all too familiar picture of how the Uzbek authorities are failing to put their much-publicized reform process into practice. This includes obstacles to freedom of associations, a right that the Ministry of Justice does not respect due to inadequate control, as well as the unclear and opaque conditions it imposes on associations seeking to register following the law, ”the human rights defenders note.

Brigitte Dufour, Director of IPHR, called on the authorities to take immediate action to allow Human Rights House to register and contribute to improving human rights in Uzbekistan.

Turgunov has already received his eighth refusal since February 2019. And this happened again after the last EU-Uzbekistan Human Rights Dialogue in June 2021. EU representatives expressed serious concern about the obstacles faced by non-governmental organizations in trying to obtain registration.

Earlier, ACCA informed about the twists and turns of the seventh attempt to register a new human rights organization. On December 4, 2019, the Minister of Justice Ruslanbek Davletov personally familiarized himself with the documentation and was skeptical about the prospects for the emergence of the “House of Human Rights”, unequivocally stating the imminent refusal of registration and advised to prepare a lawsuit.

“I do not see any further appeal on the registration of the Human Rights House as promising, so I believe that the obstacles set by the Ministry of Justice must be overcome only in court,” says Uzbek lawyer Sergei Mayorov.

“Registration of human rights organizations is the first step towards the legalization of human rights defenders in Uzbekistan, but it was the Ministry of Justice that became the source of restrictions on the right to freedom of associations, and this right is enshrined in the Constitution of Uzbekistan and the obligations to fulfill the conditions of Article 22 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights. This situation deserves the serious attention of the international community, ”said Nadezhda Atayeva, President of the AHRCA.

The Special Rapporteur on the situation of human rights defenders and the Special Rapporteur on human rights have already been informed in the UN Committee of the obstacles in the registration process for the founders of the Human Rights House.

On March 4, 2021, President Shavkat Mirziyoyev approved the Concept for the Development of Civil Society for 2021-2025 and the Roadmap for its implementation. However, the Concept does not address an issue of central importance to independent civil society groups in Uzbekistan, namely, clarification of the procedures and criteria that are applied when registering NGOs.

After the presidential initiative, the Ministry of Justice promptly presented a bill creating the illusion of protecting non-governmental non-profit organizations. The document remains in the status of a legislative initiative.