Civil society in Uzbekistan continues to suffer from restrictions to freedom of speech and barriers to the legal registration of non-governmental organisations (NGOs). Legislation that limits the right to peaceful assembly places excessive requirements on organisers of public meetings.
Yet while the Uzbekistani state stifles civic space, the government boasts of the number of non-governmental organisations in the country and insists that it is implementing measures to “radically increase the role of civil society institutions in the process of democratic renewal of the country”.
The reality is that many of these organisations are, in fact, in some sense controlled by the state.
