Uzbekistan has quietly built one of Central Asia’s largest rosters of naturalized Russian athletes, spanning rowing, tennis, figure skating, swimming and fencing. The strategy delivers medals but raises hard questions about what it costs domestic talent and the sports budgets meant to develop it.
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.
A joint study by UNDP and the Anti-Corruption Agency, presented at a Tashkent roundtable on 25 May 2026, found that healthcare and education are the sectors where women are most exposed to corruption, while nearly 70% of respondents linked informal social practices to the spread of corrupt behaviour.
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.
