Uzbekistan in 2003

447,400 sq km (172,700 sq mi)
(2003 est.): 25,640,000
President Islam Karimov, assisted by Prime Minister Otkir Sultonov

Uzbekistan’s economy in 2003 showed little of the dynamism needed to lift the country out of the ranks of the poorer successor states to the U.S.S.R. In April the independent newspaper Hurriyat reported that between 500,000 and 700,000 Uzbek citizens had gone abroad to find work. A World Bank assessment of living standards that was published in July found that over a quarter of the population was living below the poverty line. After a reported drop of 22% in foreign investment in 2002, which made Uzbekistan the state with the lowest rate of foreign investment in the Commonwealth of Independent States, Pres. Islam Karimov issued a series of decrees that were ostensibly intended to liberalize the country’s economy and make it more attractive to foreign investors. Karimov announced that small business would be the engine for economic development, but small businessmen reported that they were being discouraged by widespread corruption. A decree in March was supposed to loosen state control over private farmers, but at the end of October a nationwide organization of farmers said its members were still being told what to plant by local government officials.

Karimov regarded as a major triumph for his policy of gradual economic liberalization and minimal democratization the decision of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to hold the annual meeting of its board in Tashkent in May. The EBRD explained the choice as a means of encouraging Uzbekistan to improve its performance. Before the meeting international human rights groups soundly criticized the bank for appearing to ignore the human rights abuses committed by the Uzbek authorities; during the meeting some foreign participants lectured their Uzbek hosts on this issue, but critics complained that little was achieved beyond the setting of specific “benchmarks” that Uzbekistan had to meet in order for EBRD programs to continue. As the year continued, however, more and more citizens’ groups picketed government institutions and demonstrated publicly in support of their specific demands.

Many of the popular protests involved demands for a stop to the imprisonment of practicing Muslims who were arrested on charges of seeking to overthrow the country’s constitutional order by spreading the ideas of the international Islamic extremist party Hizb ut-Tahrir. There were also protests against the continuing use of torture by law-enforcement and prison officials, despite official Uzbek promises to stop the practice after the country was censured by the UN Commission on Human Rights in March.