1 2.3.1 Case study one: Niyozbek Yuli Street The compulsory acquisition Set among Tashkent’s fashionable bars, sushi restaurants, hotels and embassies is leafy Niyozbek Yuli Street. With its close proximity to the subway, shopping districts and city centre, it is a key target for developers looking to build upmarket residential complexes, hotels and shopping centres. On 21 November 2017, the Tashkent City hokim issued decree no. 1544.45 It is notable for four things. First, it orders the eviction of residents living on demarcated land plots along Niyozbek Yuli, Sharofobod, Malyasova and Lashkarbegi streets. Second, it proposes to incorporate the 10.4 hectares of freed land into the city of Tashkent reserve fund and then reallocate the ‘vacated’ land to a private developer, Steel Quality Business, for permanent use. Third, Steel Quality Business is given responsibility for compensating residential and non-residential property owners impacted by the eviction, and then completing a demolition exercise. Fourth, the hokim does not cite any legal authority that would provide grounds for curbing the private property rights of homeowners and businesses. The decision is anchored by the hokim in articles 5 and 10 of the law On Local Government Authority,46 and the Cabinet of Ministers regulation dated 29 May 2006, On Approval of the Procedure for Compensation of Damage Caused to Citizens and Legal Entities in Connection with the Confiscation of Land Plots for State and Public Needs.47 Article 10 of the law on local government authority states: ‘The hokim of the province and the city of Tashkent have the right to grant permanent use of land plots and to terminate the right to own and use land in cases provided for by law.’48 The other ‘law’ relied upon by the hokim of Tashkent – contained in Cabinet of Ministers resolution no. 97 – is a by-law. It does not appear to provide the grounds, 50. therefore, to override private property rights set out in legislation with superior status. Furthermore, this by-law only permits the compulsory acquisition of landed property by the state for a number of circumscribed public purposes (see 2.1). No enumerated public purpose is cited in the mayoral decree. Furthermore, none of the public needs set out in the by-law are cognate with what decree no.1544 proposes, which involves the forfeiture of private property and its reallocation to a private company for a real estate development. In addition, under article 23 of the Land Code, before land can be allocated it must first be acquired by the state and registered as state property in the land reserve fund before it can then be auctioned or allocated to a private developer.49 This is confirmed by the Deputy Minister of Justice, Aktam Mukhammadiev, in a 2022 letter to impacted residents. Mukhammadiev observes: ‘In particular, firstly, the decision [no. 1544] does not provide for the [lawful] seizure of the land plot, and secondly, it is impossible to provide (sell) a land plot that is in possession, use, lease and ownership without its seizure (redemption) in the prescribed manner.’50 The letter recounts the circumscribed bases upon which acquisition for public need can be actioned by the hokimiyat (Tashkent City municipality). Deputy Minister Mukhammadiev then notes that under the law applicable at the time this decree was passed, it was incumbent upon the Tashkent hokim to: (1) inform the developer that the land plots could not be provided owing to prior private ownership; and (2) to offer the developer alternative, available, land plots.51 As a result, the letter notes: ‘Due to the fact that the decision of the hokim of the city of Tashkent dated November 21, 2017 No. 1544 does not provide for the [lawful] withdrawal of a land plot, there are no legal grounds for negotiations related to compensation for damage caused to owners in connection with the withdrawal of a land plot for state and public needs.’ Mukhammadiev Aktam Zainiddinovich, Deputy Minister of Justice, Letter to Niyozbek Yuli Residents, 26 August 2022. A False Sense of Legality 21