abdujalil

Jul 162009
 

Ms. Navi Pillay
High Commissioner for Human Rights
United Nations
Geneva/ Switzerland

Subject: Human rights situation in Camp Ashraf-Iraq

Dear Ms. Pillay
Since January 1st, 2009, when the protection of Camp Ashraf in Iraq has been transferred from US forces to the Iraqi government, the international community is faced with an increasing anxiety over the violation of the most basic rights of 3500 people in Camp Ashraf who 1000 of them are women.  Ashraf is home to the members of the Iranian opposition, People’s Mojahedin Organization of Iran (PMOI).
Following the Iranian regime’s supreme leader called imperatively on 28 February 2009, on Iraqi government to implement their bilateral agreement to expel PMOI members from Iraq as quickly as possible, the concerns and worries have escalated. In this regard, the Iraqi authorities have threatened to attack buildings in Ashraf and are insisting to displace residents of Ashraf to remote locations in Iraq against international law. Amnesty International has in particular expressed its concern over the statement by Iraqi National Security Advisor who confessed,” The authorities are planning to make their presence in Iraq gradually intolerable “. Continue reading »

Jun 242009
 

Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan

S  T  A  T  E  M  E  N  T
on Poverty in Uzbekistan

That fact which follows from human nature that any capable, sane person cannot subject the members of the family to poverty at his own will. It is an axiom.
Short of wars, natural cataclysms and various epidemics which can sometimes occur in the history of this or that state, one of the dangerous social harms – poverty, is a direct consequence of the  criminal policy of the powermongering dictators. Good will of heads of state and freedom given to the people, multiplied by diligence and the initiative of people, leads to state prosperity even if it is not completely rich with natural resources. Japan is one of the best examples to acknowledge the fact. Continue reading »

Jun 182009
 
Title Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Annual Report 2009 – Uzbekistan
Publisher International Federation for Human Rights
Country Uzbekistan
Publication Date 18 June 2009
Cite as International Federation for Human Rights, Observatory for the Protection of Human Rights Defenders Annual Report 2009 – Uzbekistan, 18 June 2009, available at: http://www.unhcr.org/refworld/docid/4a5f302423.html [accessed 28 August 2009] Continue reading »
Jun 122009
 

TODAY is World Day Against Child Labor!


This year is especially important because 2009 marks the tenth anniversary of the adoption of ILO Convention No. 182, which addresses the need for action to eliminate the worst forms of child labor.


Find out more about World Day Against Child Labor on ILRF’s website here.

ILRF has a long history of working to stop child labor. We continue to support international conventions in addition to national and local legislation to reduce the worst forms of child labor and ensure that all workers’ rights are protected. Keep reading to find out:

What ILRF is doing to stop child labor

What YOU can do to stop child labor

Cotton
This week, ILRF Executive Director Bama Athreya is in Geneva at the International Labor Conference, the ILO’s annual gathering. ILRF helped to organize an event yesterday about the continued use of forced child labor in Uzbekistan’s cotton industry. The event featured speakers including Kailash Satyarthi of the Global March Against Child Labor as well as many other leading figures from human rights and labor organizations, government officials and companies.  The agenda from the event is available online here.

The event in Geneva comes less than a week after ILRF released a new report detailing how forced child labor continues to be used in the most recent cotton harvest in Uzbekistan. Additionally, Uzbek human rights advocates just released a new call for an international boycott of Uzbek cotton.

Jun 112009
 

Only a boycott of Uzbek cotton can convince the
Karimov regime to stop forced child labor in this country!
An open letter from Uzbek civic activists to:
· The European Union
· The United States Administration
· Companies importing cotton, textiles,
and cotton products
· International Executive Committee of
Cotton, Textiles, and Cotton Products;
Bremen Cotton Exchange; Gdynia
Cotton Association
· World Bank
· Asian Development Bank
cc:
· United Nations Human Rights Council
· International Labor Organization
· UNICEF
· European Bank for Reconstruction and
Development
· The Government and Citizens of
Uzbekistan
· Those concerned about human rights
in Uzbekistan
June 3, 2009
Summary:
· Despite ratifying International Labor Organization (ILO) conventions, Uzbekistan
continues to use forced child labor.
· Uzbekistan does not reinvest the proceeds from its cotton exports into cotton
producers and the rural areas where it is grown, but siphons it into the hands of a
small group of the country’s ruling elites.
· World Bank and Asian Development Bank loans to Uzbekistan’s agricultural sector
have not led to genuine reform. Uzbekistan’s continued reliance upon a command
economy paves the way for loans to go into the hands of the ruling elite. Activists are
calling for international financial instruments to lend to the Uzbek agro-sector only
on a conditional basis, to encourage the reforms that would free Uzbek farmers
from the tyranny of a corrupt regime.
· Activists are calling for a boycott of Uzbek cotton. They call upon companies
importing cotton, in particular the Dubai Multi Commodities Centre , as well as
retailers, to adhere to the principles of corporate social responsibility
· The international community should not take at face value mere spoken or written
commitments made by Uzbekistan, but should demand actions demonstrating a
complete end to the practice of forced child labor that can be verified via an
independent monitoring during the cotton season.
· Activists call on the U.S. government and the EU to take steps to prevent their
markets from being penetrated by products bearing traces of forced child labor. Continue reading »

Jun 042009
 

http://www.laborrights.org/sites/default/files/publications-and-resources/UzbekCottonFall08Report.pdf

1
Initiative of a group of Uzbek human rights activists and researchers in partnership
with the International Labor Rights Forum
“We Live Subject to their Orders”:
A Three?Province Survey of Forced Child Labor in
Uzbekistan’s 2008 Cotton Harvest
Tashkent – New York, 2009
2
Table of contents
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….3
INTRODUCTION ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………5
BACKGROUND………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..5
METHODOLOGY ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..9
CHILDREN’S WORK ON THE 2008 HARVEST…………………………………………………………………………………….10
‘FIRST WE FORBADE THE CHILDREN FROM GOING OUT INTO THE FIELDS, AND THEN WE CHASED THEM OUT THERE TO
PICK COTTON’ ………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………10
CHAIN OF COMMAND …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….13
COERCION……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………15
CONDITIONS IN THE FIELDS …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….20
CONSEQUENCES ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………24
SOCIAL ATTITUDES ……………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….25
CONCLUSIONS…………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………….27
APPENDIX: …………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………………..29
QUESTIONNAIRE FOR INTERVIEWING SCHOOLCHILDREN………………………………………………………………………………29
RESOLUTION OF THE CABINET OF MINISTERS, NO 207 ………………………………………………………………………………..31
3
Executive Summary
Uzbekistan is the world’s sixth largest producer of cotton, and the third largest exporter. For
decades, it has used the forced labor of its schoolchildren starting in the early primary grades, college
and university students, and civil servants, to harvest that cotton by hand. Unlike child labor in
agricultural sectors in some other countries, this practice is organized and controlled by the central
government. Each fall, shortly after the start of the school year, the government orders schools to close
and school administrators to send the children out to the fields, where they remain until the cotton
harvest is brought in. The current report is based on seventy?two interviews in three different provinces
with participants in the fall 2008 harvest. Continue reading »

May 282009
 

Human Rights Society of Uzbekistan

S  T  A  T  E  M  E  N  T

in Connection with the Ratification of the Convention of the United Nations against Corruption by Uzbekistan.

It is pleasant that Uzbekistan joined the Convention of the United Nations Organization against Corruption on July, 29th, 2008 which was accepted by the UN on October, 31st, 2003 . Experts from Europe, the United States and Central Asia held in Tashkent an anticorruption seminar from March, 31st till April, 1st organised by UNODC — United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime. Radio “Free Europe” informed on May, 21st, 2009 in its on-line edition that Ambassador of the USA in Uzbekistan Richard Norland declared that the United States was ready to render Uzbekistan technical assistance with a view of implication provisions of the United Nations Continue reading »