Author: Dilshod Ergashev

British Ambassador Timothy Smart is departing Tashkent after three years, leaving behind a bilateral trade relationship that expanded nearly eightfold, a new international commercial court in the works, and deepened security ties — with a high-level Uzbek delegation to London still to come.

A visually impaired Tashkent resident was denied a routine power of attorney on July 24 because a 2019 Ministry of Justice regulation prohibits the facsimile signatures that national disability law explicitly authorises. The Tashkent City Department of Justice defended the refusal, citing a Cabinet of Ministers resolution that requires a specialist of a profession that does not officially exist.

Chinese Premier Li Qiang visited Tashkent on 17 October 2026, meeting President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and Prime Minister Abdulla Aripov. Beijing pledged to increase imports of Uzbek products, reaffirmed commitment to the China-Kyrgyzstan-Uzbekistan railway, and identified energy, artificial intelligence and modern agriculture as priority areas for expanded cooperation.

President Shavkat Mirziyoyev signed legislation imposing life imprisonment for sexual violence against children under 14, as the government simultaneously announced a 30% rise in heating tariffs, dismissed the defense minister, reshuffled four Tashkent district governors, and arrested a deputy district governor for a $25,000 bribe.

The Competition Committee reviewed 878 draft regulatory acts submitted through the government’s unified legislative portal in 2025 and found that 425 — nearly half — contained provisions contradicting competition law. The rate was highest for Presidential-level acts, where 147 of 239 drafts, or 61.5%, were flagged.

Kyrgyzstan’s Ministry of Agriculture has proposed banning apple imports until February 2027 and potato imports until March 2027, a move that would close a key seasonal market for Uzbek agricultural exporters at the height of the harvest period.

A third of the country’s teachers have been rated unsatisfactory in their own subjects, base salaries remain well below a presidential pledge, and documented incidents of officials publicly humiliating educators have accelerated a flight from the profession that is hollowing out public schooling.

Representatives of non-governmental organizations from all 14 regions of Uzbekistan have completed a structured training program on public oversight, open data analysis, and anti-corruption legislative review, under a project jointly implemented by the Anti-Corruption Agency and international partners from Latvia and Kyrgyzstan.

IPU President Tulia Ackson told young parliamentarians gathered in Samarkand that they must use legislative tools, budget decisions, and parliamentary oversight to demand accountability for human rights violations, warning that armed conflicts have reached their highest level since World War II.