Nadira Alieva, Craig Murray’s Uzbek girlfriend, told the British tabloid press how difficult it had been arriving in the UK with the former ambassador back in December. The story took on some uncharming shades and revealed maybe too much of the couple’s private life.
After overcoming the initial financial hardships that made the couple eat toast […]

As I am from Berlin (which is, to my knowledge, still without a proper Uzbek restaurant) and have lived some years in London (where there is at least Shish, a Central Asian eatery), news like this is very relevant: It demonstrates how Eastern Europe is slowly overtaking the West in terms of culinary variety.
The […]

If you’re a frequent visitor to our homebase, you will have seen our intrusive campaign to get people fill in our survey. Now, if you haven’t seen this yet, please consider taking some minutes to tell us what you think about us and what we might do better in the future. For those making […]

Editor’s Note: This article was originally published on Thinking-East in 2005.
Fardona (20, from Uzbekistan) tells us about her life — a life that is not easy, living in a country in which women’s rights are becoming ever more difficult to retain.
Although I am 20 years old and to some of you it may seem […]

Editor’s Note: What follows is part of a cross-blog survey that explores minorities in Central Asia. This article was originally published on Thinking-East in 2005.
Nafisa Hasanova (22, from Uzbekistan) dares to violate taboo: she visits the Luli, Central Asian Romas, whose community has been marginalised in her hometown of Samarkand. However, in a tragic […]

Today, 9 January 2007, marks the end of Karimov’s term as the president of Uzbekistan - at least according to the Uzbek constitution. The Uzbek parliament, however, decided back in 2002 that presidential elections are only to be held later this year, in December. There is thus an interesting divergence between legislation and constitution, […]

The fact that Berlin’s Humboldt University is one of the only university with a Central Asia and Caucasus faculty is relatively little-known. This might be due to the fact that the “Zentralasien Seminar” is focusing mainly on culture, languages and history and doesn’t have the in-house experts that speak at prominent Anglo-Saxon research events.
While […]

Dr. Andrea Berg of Human Rights Watch recently spoke at a SOAS conference in London. Unsurprisingly, her topic was “In the Name of Combating Terrorism: Human Rights and Security in Uzbekistan”. It’s always interesting to recall that HRW does actually still have an office in Tashkent. Most of her insights have been published elsewhere […]

It seems as if the recent Uzbek PR campaign didn’t pay off. The EU’s decision to extend the sanctions in place since November last year has led to disappointment and surprise among Uzbek government officials, reports Eurasianet:
The EU’s move appeared to catch Uzbek officials off guard. “We are very surprised,” an Uzbek government official […]

Recently, we introduced our non-Uzbek speakers to a blog written by Uzbek women called Ayollar Bekati. Here are some translations of recent topics. They include:

“When my sister tries to protect her son, her husband beats her instead” — a very personal story about domestic violence
The schoolchidren in Tajikistan are no longer sent to pick […]