Forced evictions continue in Uzbekistan, despite concerns of UN Special Rapporteur

Despite concerns expressed by the UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing, the Uzbek court continues its practice of forced evictions.

Balakrishnan Rajagopal, UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing, in his letter to Uzbek Minister of Foreign Affaires from 15.12.2020, spoke about the eviction of Olga Abdullaeva and her family from their own house in the center of Tashkent.

Balakrishnan Rajagopal, UN Special Rapporteur on Adequate Housing, in his letter to Uzbek Minister of Foreign Affaires, expressed concerning eviction of Olga Abdullaeva and her family from their own house in the center of Tashkent.

Letter of the Special Rapporteur to Komilov, Uzbek Foreign Minister

Olga Abdullaeva is the owner of a house in the center of Tashkent. She lives with her daughter and three grandchildren. On May 2018, the former mayor of Tashkent decided  unilaterally to give a concession to the private company, LLC Training Project, for its commercial project – construction of 13-storey building – in area neighboring the house of Olga. This unknown little LLC Training Project proposed to Olga inadequate compensation and filed a request with the court to obtain forced eviction of Olga and her family.

Olga Abdullaeva speaking on a press-conference

On October 2019, the judge of the inter-district court of Mirabad, Mrs M. Zakirova, issued an order on eviction. She based on Article 71 of the Housing Code, governing evictions from residential buildings of municipal, departmental housing stock and municipal housing stock, although Olga is the OWNER of her house. It’s HER PRIVATE house. Olga was offered a house of smaller size in a remote area and far from the children’s Russian language school.

On March 2020, the appeal instance of the Tashkent City Court for Civil Cases dismissed the appeal filed by Olga against eviction order and upheld the decision of the inter-district court.

The Deputy Ombudsman issued a statement concerning the case highlighting that a number of national norms had been violated. The Ombudsman sent a communication to the Supreme Court concerning the case of Olga, in which it pointed to the failure to comply with national provisions and regulations applying to the case.

Autumn 2020, despite the fact that Olga’s case was pending before the Supreme Court, officials from the Attorney General’s Enforcement Bureau came twice to try to carry out the forced eviction procedure. These attempts to evict were suspended by local authorities.

It should be said that in Uzbekistan, the procedure of forced eviction takes place very harshly, in the presence of a huge crowd of security forces, with gates being cut open and doors, windows, and utilities (water, gas, light…) being broken down. Special people rudely enter the house, take out all the owners’ belongings and load them into trucks.

December 2020, the Supreme Court cancelled the decisions of two lower courts and sent the case of Olga Abdullaeva to the inter-district court for reconsideration.

Reconsideration began this spring, and again the judge (Khazratkulov O.) ruled on forced eviction solely on the basis of “his inner conviction”, without reference to any law. This October, the Tashkent City court upheld the decision of the lower court…..