Human rights group welcome Uzbekistan sanctions

EU Observer October 5 Human rights activists have welcomed an EU decision to impose sanctions on Uzbekistan. Meeting in Luxembourg on Monday (3 October) EU foreign ministers strongly condemned the Uzbek authorities' refusal to allow an independent international inquiry into the killing of demonstrators in Andijan in May. It is the first time the EU has suspended a Partnership and Cooperation Agreement with another country; it also imposed an arms embargo on Uzbekistan. Human rights groups have claimed that several hundred people died in the uprising and accused president Islam Karimov of covering up the killings, while the Uzbek authorities claim that 187 people died and deny that troops fired on unarmed civilians. "With today's decision, the EU has given much-needed concrete meaning to its human rights policy," said Holly Cartner, Europe and Central Asia director of Human Rights Watch. The organisation said the arms embargo was similar to the one imposed on China following the Tiananmen Square massacre in 1989. But Human Rights Watch urged the bloc to raise its concerns about Uzbekistan with Russian President Vladimir Putin and seek Russia's support for an independent, international inquiry into the Andijan events. Russia has been a staunch supporter of Uzbekistan since the Andijan massacre. Joint military exercises between the two countries took place in September, two months after the Uzbek government asked the United States to leave its military base in southern Uzbekistan, the group said. The EU decision includes a mandate to follow closely the outcome of the ongoing trials of those accused of participating in, and precipitating the demonstration. Independent organisations have alleged unfair trials based on confessions extracted under duress of fifteen persons tried for subversive activities in connection with the event. The embargo runs for an initial period of one year. It also includes travel restrictions on "those individuals directly responsible for the indiscriminate and disproportionate use of force in Andijan".