Uzbekistan: The Ombudsman’s press service reacted to the publication of ACCA
On April 20, the Ombudsman’s press service issued a report on the situation with respect for the rule of law in penitentiary institutions. It appeared after the ACCA’s publication “Uzbekistan: convicts are beaten and forced to give false testimony” on April 19.
In it and in previous articles, the ACCA human rights portal emphasized the formality of visits to colonies and quoted Feruza Eshmatova, who has been Ombudsman since February 2021. She stated that she personally almost never met cases of torture in places of execution of punishment. According to her, none of the interlocutors, interviewed during the visits, had complaints of torture, beatings or moral pressure.
ACCA emphasized that there are no new data on the results of monitoring visits of the Ombudsman after January-September 2021, supplementing the picture of what is happening in the colonies with information about bullying and torture received from initiative human rights groups.
It’s worth recalling that last year in Uzbekistan, seven employees of the internal affairs bodies, who tortured prisoners, were subjected to disciplinary sanctions.
Meanwhile, the Commissioner for Human Rights provides data on collective conversations with more than 4.5 thousand people, as well as individual conversations with 758 citizens. Moreover, the Ombudsman received 6,104 appeals from persons held in closed institutions, as well as from their close relatives and lawyers.
“It should be noted that quarterly analytical information and the annual report of the Commissioner for monitoring visits to prevent torture were presented to the chambers of the Oliy Majlis,” the Ombudsman notes. However, the content of these reports is not available in the public space.
ACCA constantly records violations of the rights of prisoners up to physical violence, and these facts were completely ignored by the Ombudsman’s Office, where prisoners and their relatives repeatedly wrote at the suggestion of human rights activists.
The Ombudsman’s message also notes that ‘for the first time, the media and bloggers took part in the visits’. But there is so little evidence of information support that it’s realistic to speak of their complete absence.
The chairman of the human rights society of Uzbekistan “Ezgulik” Abdurahmon Tashanov, at the international conference “Prospects for the development of the national preventive mechanism in Uzbekistan based on international standards” held on October 8, 2021, noted a decrease in inhuman torture against convicts, unwittingly recognizing their existence.
At one of the meetings, the deputy of the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis Rasul Kusherbayev, in his speech, recalled a meeting in 2020, at which the previous Ombudsman Ulugbek Mukhammadiev stated that 139 prisoners reported torture in places of execution of punishment in 2019, but according to the results of inspections, not a single case has been confirmed.
