Land rights violation monitoring for this report was
conducted by the Uzbek Forum for Human Rights,
an NGO that has over 15 years of dedicated experience
monitoring human rights violations in Uzbekistan.
The Uzbek Forum monitors identified violations in
rural areas impacted by large-scale cotton production,
where rights violations were being alleged. Monitors
collected documentary sources pertaining to the
alleged rights violations (such as court judgments,
official documents and correspondence), and
conducted 50 interviews with victims in five regions:
Fergana, Namangan, Syrdarya, Khorezm and Andijan.
In addition, dozens of articles and social media
posts were analysed. Records collected during the
monitoring process were uploaded to Uwazi for
further verification and qualitative analysis.
Given the multicultural and multilingual context in
Uzbekistan, interviews and testimonies were conducted
in the local languages, Uzbek and Russian, and were
translated accordingly. In some cases, corporate
developers were implicated directly or indirectly in
criticised events involving land and home confiscations.
These corporate actors were invited to respond to a
series of questions relating to the confiscations.
Where a response was received, it is included in
the relevant case study.
8 A False Sense of Legality