Skip to main content

Eurasianet

Main Menu

  • Regions
  • Topics
  • Media
  • About
  • Search
  • Newsletter
  • русский
  • Support us
X

Caucasus

Armenia
Azerbaijan
Georgia

Central Asia

Kazakhstan
Kyrgyzstan
Tajikistan
Turkmenistan
Uzbekistan

Conflict Zones

Abkhazia
Nagorno Karabakh
South Ossetia

Eastern Europe

Belarus
Moldova
Russia
The Baltics
Ukraine

Eurasian Fringe

Afghanistan
China
EU
Iran
Mongolia
Turkey
United Kingdom
United States
X

Environment

Economy

Politics

Kazakhstan's Bloody January 2022
Kyrgyzstan 2020 unrest

Security

Society

American diplomats in Central Asia
Arts and Culture
Coronavirus
Student spotlight
X

Visual Stories

Podcast
Video

Blogs

Tamada Tales
The Bug Pit

Podcasts

EurasiaChat
Expert Opinions
The Central Asianist
X
You can search using keywords to narrow down the list.

Washington Slams Uzbekistan over Human Trafficking

Joanna Lillis Jun 20, 2013
image A poster in Tashkent offers a warning about human trafficking. Joanna Lillis

The United States has given Uzbekistan the lowest possible rating in its annual report on human trafficking and forced labor. 
Uzbekistan was downgraded (along with Russia and China) from Tier 2 to Tier 3 in the State Department’s annual Trafficking in Persons report for failing to make sufficient efforts to combat the trade in human flesh. 
The June 19 report had harsh words for Tashkent: “The Government of Uzbekistan remains one of only a handful of governments around the world that subjects its citizens to forced labor through implementation of state policy.” 
The use of forced labor in the cotton harvest featured strongly in the findings: “Internal labor trafficking remains prevalent during the annual cotton harvest, in which children and adults are victims of government-organized forced labor. There were reports that working conditions in some fields during the cotton harvest included verbal and physical abuse and lack of freedom of movement.”
There was no immediate reaction from Tashkent, which has always denied state-sponsored forced labor and points to its efforts to combat people trafficking.
The US report noted that last year Tashkent enforced a decree banning child labor in the cotton fields, resulting in a “sweeping reduction” in the number of children under age 15 in the harvest, but said that older children and adults were still being forced to reap cotton.
Uzbekistan has refused repeated requests to allow the International Labor Organization to monitor the harvest of a crop so vital to Uzbekistan’s economy that it is dubbed “white gold.” The harvest is effectively reliant on forced labor, since government-set cotton quotas that farmers must meet for artificially low prices make it unfeasible to pay a living wage.
The report also noted concerns about forced labor in other sectors and about human trafficking and sex trafficking within Uzbekistan and to countries including Kazakhstan, Russia, Turkey, Malaysia, Thailand, and UAE.
Anti-trafficking efforts over the past year were “mixed,” the State Department said. Tashkent had identified more sex trafficking and transnational labor trafficking victims in 2012 than in 2011, and last year convicted eight officials on charges of complicity in trafficking. In one case, however, a citizen’s allegations of official involvement in trafficking her brothers “resulted in what appeared to be an effort to silence her” – she was jailed for seven years on extortion charges but released on amnesty after seven months.
The report’s recommendations included taking “substantive action” to end forced labor, including child labor, in the cotton harvest; allowing international monitoring; prosecuting officials suspected of complicity in trafficking; and providing better support for trafficking victims.
The downgrade for Uzbekistan to the lowest-possible rating came after six years on the report’s Tier 2 Watch List.
Follow @joannalillis

Joanna Lillis is a journalist based in Almaty and author of Dark Shadows: Inside the Secret World of Kazakhstan.

Sign up for Eurasianet's free weekly newsletter. Support Eurasianet: Help keep our journalism open to all, and influenced by none.

Popular

Kazakhstan: Ambitious renewables agenda setting healthy pace
Almaz Kumenov
Uzbekistan: Court sentences citizen reporter to eight years in prison
Central Asia: Is the China-Kyrgyz-Uzbek railway project encountering a red signal?
China-Central Asia Monitor

Eurasianet

  • About
  • Team
  • Contribute
  • Republishing
  • Privacy Policy
  • Corrections
  • Contact
Eurasianet © 2023