Report of the political opposition movement “Erkin O’zbekiston” (Free Uzbekistan) at the First Session of the 1st OSCE ODIHR Supplementary Human Dimension Implementation Meeting. City of Vienna (Austria), 17 March 2025.

The lack of opportunities for independent journalistic investigations in Uzbekistan raises numerous questions about the true causes and consequences of the bloody events in Karakalpakstan that took place in early July 2022.

In order to hide the traces of their crimes, through the media and public GONGO organisations under their control, the Uzbek authorities continue to lie to the citizens of the country and the international community about the real number of people killed and injured.

Thus, on 26 December 2024, the Parliamentary Commission for the Study of the Events that Occurred in Karakalpakstan released its report, which states that 21 people died during those events. This is an absolute lie. In suppressing the protests in Karakalpakstan, the Mirziyoyev regime carried out a bloodbath, mercilessly killing more than 250 protesters and seriously injuring nearly 1,000 people.

Due to the deliberate targeting and intimidation of journalists, the world community still has no idea of the real scale of the tragedy in Karakalpakstan.

Further: at the end of 2022, the whole world was shocked by the news of mass deaths of children in Uzbekistan. In the course of redistribution of the pharmaceutical market in Uzbekistan, competing groups had dumped poisoned ‘DOK-1 MAX’ drugs into the market. As a result of the inhumane actions of the Mirziyoyev regime’s groups, hundreds of children have died in agonising suffering.

The lack of independent media and an independent judicial system in Uzbekistan has once again allowed the Mirziyoyev regime to hide the true causes of the deaths of children and the real number of victims.

During the official visit of the President of Uzbekistan to France on 11-13 March this year, President Emmanuel Macron awarded Shavkat Mirziyoyev the Legion of Honour. We strongly condemn these actions by Macron.

By awarding a mass murderer with France’s highest honour, Emmanuel Macron has inflicted a despicable slap on the people of Uzbekistan.

The mass murder of the Mirziyoyev regime must not go unpunished!

We call on all interested forces to initiate international criminal prosecution of Shavkat Mirziyoyev as the main defendant in the following cases:

— about the mass killings of protesters in Karakalpakstan in July 2022

— massacres of children in Uzbekistan in October-December 2022.

At the same time, the political opposition movement “Erkin O’zbekiston” (Free Uzbekistan) officially declares its commitment to the sovereignty, independence, unity and territorial integrity of Uzbekistan within its internationally recognised borders.

We also strongly condemn any manifestations of separatism in the Republic of Uzbekistan.