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	EU maintains sanctions against Uzbekistan over poor human rights record by International Herald Tribune & agencies Uzbekistan   May 2007   The European Union has decided to maintain limited sanctions against Uzbekistan because of the country"s poor human rights record.   The organisation"s external relations commissioner, Benita Ferrero-Waldner, said it was important to encourage progress in human rights dialogue with Tashkent while making it clear the EU remained concerned.   "This gives the chance for the Uzbeks to really show that they mean what they said in the last human rights council and we think this is a way of engaging with the Uzbeks," she said. The EU also called on Uzbekistan to release jailed human rights activists such as Gulbahor Turayeva.   Moscow. May 6, 2007   The European Union must pressure Uzbekistan to release imprisoned human rights defenders, by Allison Gill. (IHT)   In two years as a human rights researcher in Uzbekistan, one of the most repressive countries of Central Asia, I monitored dozens of unfair trials and documented every kind of due-process violation.   I never witnessed an acquittal - a reduced sentence or speedy amnesty was the best anyone could hope for. I interviewed hundreds of victims of horrific abuses. I also had the privilege of working with incredibly courageous and dedicated people: Uzbekistan"s human rights defenders. I daily witnessed how the government interfered in their work, harassed them, threatened and beat them.   Since the massacre in the eastern city of Andijan in May 2005, when government forces killed hundreds of protesters, the government has maintained a brutal campaign against human rights activists. More than a dozen of my former colleagues are now behind bars, and at least a dozen more have fled the country.   Yet somehow none of this prepared me for the verdict against my dear friend and colleague, Umida Niazova, who was sentenced on May 1 to seven years" imprisonment on trumped-up charges. Umida, a journalist and human rights activist, also worked as a translator for Human Rights Watch in Tashkent, accompanying me and others to monitor trials and translate the proceedings from Uzbek to Russian.   In April, the Uzbek government charged Umida with illegal border crossing, smuggling and distributing material causing public disorder. The authorities say Umida "smuggled" her laptop into the country because she didn"t declare it on her customs form, though she made no effort to conceal it - she put it through the customs X-ray machine. They say she distributed materials found on her laptop that are allegedly "extremist" and "fundamentalist" - including Human Rights Watch"s report on the Andijan events.   Even witnesses for the prosecution testified that there was no evidence she had distributed them. But that made no impact on the court, which barred diplomats from the trial and forbade all present from taking notes.   Umida is in prison today because the Uzbek government refuses to tolerate scrutiny or accountability.   But she is also in prison because governments in the West have failed to push for tangible change. The European Union imposed limited sanctions on Uzbekistan following the Andijan killings, but it has not made the fate of Uzbekistan"s imprisoned human rights defenders a precondition for easing the sanctions. That sent an unmistakable message to the Uzbek government.   Despite Umida"s commitment to Uzbekistan, last fall she said she felt the pressure against her and her colleagues growing and worried about providing a safe home for her two-year-old son Elbek. We began to look for opportunities for her to work or study abroad. But we were too late.   It is not too late, however, for the European Union to pursue a principled strategy on Uzbekistan, a strategy that has at its core the lives of Uzbeks and its own principles, rather than political expediency.   On May 14, the Union is to decide whether to lift the targeted sanctions. Ahead of this decision, the Union has urged the Uzbek government to agree to a human rights dialogue, instead of demanding the release of people like Umida. But what kind of dialogue about human rights is plausible when the people who work in honor of those rights languish in prison?   This is not the time for mere dialogue. This is the time to save lives: Umida, Mutabar Tojjbaeva, Saidjahon Zainatbitdinov, Gulbahor Turaeva and the other human rights defenders were imprisoned for daring to work for a better future. Without their release, any dialogue would be meaningless and discredit the European Union as a promoter of human rights.   * Allison Gill is the Moscow office director at Human Rights Watch and ran the Tashkent office from 2003 to 2005.
	Education under Attack by UNESCO   May 2007   Political and military violence targeting educational systems is depriving a growing number of children of the right to education, according to “Education under Attack”, a UNESCO report launched today at the Organization Headquarters in Paris.   Published on the occasion of Global Action Week (April 23-29) in favour of Education for All, the report is dedicated to Safia Ama Jan, who devoted her life to getting Afghan girls into school. She was shot and killed outside her home in Kandahar in September 2006.   “National authorities and the international community must stand united against the forces that would seek to destroy the efforts made by people such as Safia Ama Jan, said UNESCO Director-General Koïchiro Matsuura.   “Education is one of the pillars of development, prosperity and peace. It is a human right. We must do our utmost to defend and ensure the security of those who are working in this vital area.”   The report defines violent attacks as “the deliberate use of force in ways that disrupt and deter the provision of and access to education.” It examines the assassination, abduction, illegal detention and torture of students, teaching staff, trade unionists, administrators and officials. It also looks at the bombing and burning of educational buildings and the closure of institutions by force.   Forty percent of the world’s 77 million out-of-school children live in conflict-affected and post-conflict countries, where education is particularly vulnerable to attack. The study shows that Iraq’s educational system is the worst hit by violent attacks, with 30 percent of Iraq’s 3.5 million pupils now attending classes compared to 75 percent in the last school year. Baghdad universities are reporting attendance down by between 40 and 67 percent. More than 3,000 academics have fled the country.   Violent attacks are also hampering the right of young people to education in other countries, including: Afghanistan (79 incidents involving explosions, burnings and missile attacks in 2006), Colombia (310 teachers murdered between 2000 and 2006), Nepal (20,600 teachers and 22,000 students abducted between 2002 and 2006) and Thailand (130 schools burned down from 2004 to 2006).   The study, undertaken by U.K-based journalist and education specialist Brendan O’Malley, urges the international community to address the issue of violent attacks, press for an end to impunity for such attacks and extend the application of human rights instruments to cover violence against education.   It also recommends the establishment of a publicly accessible global database to facilitate the examination of trends in the scale, nature and targeting of attacks as well as qualitative research into their motives. It calls for the allocation of more resources to the International Criminal Court so that more education-related cases can be brought to trial.
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