Secret forced
sterilizations in Uzbekistan
Published: April 25, 2010 at 2:40 PM
TASHKENT, Uzbekistan,
April 25 (UPI) — Many women in Uzbekistan are sterilized without their
consent under a government order meant to reduce the number of poor
people, human rights activists say.
A human rights campaigner who requested anonymity because of fear of
detention said about 5,000 women have been sterilized without consent
since February, The Sunday Times of London reported.
Rights activists say tens of thousands of young women have been
sterilized in secret since 2003 in the former Soviet state, on orders of President Islam Karimov, who has ruled Uzbekistan since 1990. The
sterilizations were cut back in 2005 following public protest but
resumed in February, the newspaper said.
Under pressure from the health ministry, doctors pressure women to
deliver by Caesarean section and then sterilize them without obtaining
their consent, the report said. This has caused many women to opt for
home delivery to avoid the risk.
A 26-year-old woman said she was visited at home by doctors who told
her she should go to a local hospital for a checkup. She said she was
told she had a potentially fatal cyst.
“They scared me into believing I needed an urgent operation,” she
said. “I was surprised as I’d never had any pain but I was worried and
agreed to the surgery. When it was over they told me they’d performed a
sterilization. I could not stop crying. They tricked me and treated me
like an animal.”
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