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Uzbek Cotton Fair Nets $550 Million In Sales
Uzbekistan is reporting sales of some $550 million worth of cotton and textiles at the two-day International Cotton and Textile Fair held in Tashkent, RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service reports.
Some 330 companies from 38 countries reportedly sent representatives to the fair and those representatives bought a reported 600,000 tons of Uzbek cotton and [...]
Tashkent’s Cotton Fair Opens: Do Boycotts Work?
Tashkent’s 6th international cotton and textile fair opened this week, and Uzbekistan’s state media trumpeted the event, initiated by President Islam Karimov, as a triumph of the national economy and the dictator’s “Uzbek model of reform” practiced for the last 20 years since independence.
Once again, the government web site gov.uz trotted out figures [...]
Uzbekistan Holds Cotton Fair Despite Ongoing Boycott
Uzbekistan has opened its seventh International Cotton and Textile Fair in Tashkent with some 330 companies from 38 countries sending representatives, even as others boycott the event, RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service reported.
The event’s website said that the “primary goal of such an endeavor is to further expand long-term cooperation with international organizations [...]
School-Children Forced to Pick Cotton in Andijan Region; Potemkin Fields for President
Authorities have begun to mobilize school-children in Andijan province for the cotton harvest, the Uzbek-German Forum for Human Rights reports.
Starting October 6, children from Uzbekistan’s most densely-populated province of Andijan were taken to pick cotton. Earlier, local administrators (the khokimiyat) had stated that this year, they would not force middle-school children to take part [...]
Activists Oppose “Business as Usual”; Picket Uzbek-US Forum
Twenty organizations today signed a letter to US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton urging the US government not to resume “business as usual” with Uzbekistan due to persistent and serious human rights problems such as torture and forced child labor.
The groups included human rights organizations Amnesty International USA, the Berlin-based European Center for [...]
Be Not Afraid of Growing Slowly, Just of Activists Seeing Your Agenda
Last week, the American-Uzbekistan Chamber of Commerce boasted on its website that it was upgrading its annual American-Uzbek Business Forum in light of positive developments in bilateral relations:
Due to the positive developments during the recent Annual Bilateral Consultations between the Governments of the United States of America and the Republic of Uzbekistan, the Uzbek Government [...]
Activists to Picket AmChan Meeting in DC; Uzbek Foreign Minister, US DAS to Speak
Plans are proceeding apace for a picket of a business meeting of the American Uzbekistan Chamber of Commerce (AUCC) this week.
On Wednesday, September 28 at noon at the W Hotel in Washington, DC, a number of human rights and labor groups plan to protest the use of child forced labour in the cotton industry as [...]
Uzbek Children Told to Buy Their Way Out of Cotton Harvest
The independent news site uznews.net reports that children are being offered a way to buy themselves out of the cotton harvest.
In the Yukkorichirchick district of Tashkent region, the authorities have informed parents that their young children will be excused from cotton harvesting duties if parents hand over payment of 20,000 soums (around US$8.00).
“People in my [...]
Picket US-Uzbekistan Business Forum September 28
Buoyed by the success of the picket to protest inclusion of Gulnara Karimova in New York’s Fashion Week, the International Labor Rights Forum is planning a picket next week in Washington, DC as Uzbekistan’s Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Elyor Ganiev arrives for meetings with the business elite in the capital.
The Central Asian nation [...]
GooGoosha’s Fashion Show Fizzles As Protestors Converge on Cipriani
Fashion scenesters in Manhattan today were suddenly confronted with an issue half a world away in Uzbekistan — forced child labor in Tashkent’s billion-dollar cotton industry.
Driven from Lincoln Center — the main stage for New York’s Fashion Week — the Uzbek dictator’s daughter Gulnara Karimova moved her runway to Cipriani, a prestigious midtown events space, [...]
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REPORTS
Download 2012 CEGG Report Forced Child Labour in Uzbekistan
The state-controlled forced labor system of cotton production in Uzbekistan continues to violate the human rights of Uzbek children and adults in order to support the central government with revenues from cotton exports. This report identifies alarming trends of the most recent harvests, including the increased tendencies of civil servants forced to pick cotton and children forced to work the most difficult and dangerous end of the harvest. The report calls for an ILO monitoring mission and action from the governments of the European Union and the U.S., the World Bank, and the private sector to stop forced labor in the cotton sector of Uzbekistan.