Uznews.net – Tashkent-based human rights activists and political analysts are discouraged by the possible abolition of the remaining EU sanctions against Uzbekistan, and they think the human rights situation will worsen further in the country.

Rights activists believe that the sanctions which were imposed on Uzbekistan after the Andijan massacre in May 2005 have been a deterrent factor – even though the Uzbek authorities continued to violate human rights, they were cautious about doing it openly.

They presented it as violations of the law by Uzbek citizens themselves or as overdoing by individual bureaucrats in provinces. These formalities may well be forgotten now.

“I think that the complete abolition of the EU sanctions against Uzbekistan is a sort of advance payment to country that does not deserve it. These sanctions used to be a certain deterrent factor for the Uzbek authorities in their policy on human rights,” the chairwoman of the Human Rights Alliance of Uzbekistan, Yelena Urlayeva, said.

“And now when this factor has been removed, Uzbekistan will be emboldened by renewed friendship with the EU and the government will decide that it can do everything and the human rights situation will only worsen in the country,” she said.

Independent analyst Mirhan Nazmutdinov shares her concerns, and says that the problem is not only about the sanctions.

“Uzbekistan has an illegitimate government – bandits have seized power, which is why the human rights situation will not improve whether there are sanctions or not,” he said. “It is bad that a serious organisation like the EU is not capable of pursuing its policy towards Uzbekistan properly. Moreover, EU politicians perfectly understand the human rights situation in Uzbekistan,” said Surat Ikramov, the chairman of the Initiative Group of Independent Human Rights Activists of Uzbekistan.

“On the issue of abolishing the sanctions against Uzbekistan the EU is guided by geopolitical and economic interests more than interests in the human rights sphere. For example, EU countries are interested in our oil and gas, while the USA in an airbase in Navoiy.”

Ikramov said that EU officials had told him privately that if they continued to keep the sanctions Uzbekistan would shut all doors to them and this would be a big political catastrophe, while in case of tightening the sanctions, the human rights situation would still worsen in the country.

He said that EU concessions to the Uzbek government would deteriorate the situation and there would not be any possibility to tame the regime.

Despite all these arguments, the EU seems to go ahead with its decision, although Uzbek civil society activists have done everything possible to persuade them to keep the sanctions and even tighten them.

The sanctions included an embargo on weapons supplies to Uzbekistan, a reduction in financial assistance and restrictions on trade with the country, as well as a travel ban on 12 Uzbek officials responsible for the killings in Andijan.

Demands included an independent probe into the events, the release of all civil activists from prison, an end to the persecution of human rights activists, the simplification of rules for registering NGOs, the accreditation of Human Rights Watch staff and permission for UN special rapporteurs for human rights to visit the country.

A year ago most of the sanctions, except for the weapons embargo, were abolished because the EU believed that Uzbekistan had achieved progress in the human rights sphere, even though it had not fulfilled a single demand set by the EU.