LocationsThis blog is inspired by the research of judicial practice conducted by local non-government organizations ‘Khuquqiy tayanch’ (Dzijjak region) and ‘Rakhmdillik’ (Samarkand region) within the ‘Strengthening Rule of Law and Human Rights Protection in Uzbekistan’ project implemented by UNDP in Uzbekistan jointly with Ministry of Justice and Ombudsperson of Uzbekistan, funded by Government of Finland.
Monitoring practice of protecting women rights
October 8, 2024
United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) supports national governments, civil society organizations, women’s groups, and the private sector to address the root causes of gender-based violence, such as gender-based discrimination and unequal power relations. One of the ways UNDP supports this effort is by promoting policies and legislation that protect women and girls from violence. This includes working with governments to develop and implement laws that criminalize gender-based violence and ensure that victims have access to legal, medical, and psychological support.
At the same time, UNDP finds it very important to ensure that adopted legislation and policies are effectively implemented, enforced ‘on the ground’ and population especially the most vulnerable groups of population enjoys the benefits of such legislations. Therefore, UNDP also supports government in taking practical measures to implement the adopted legislation (including awareness raising events, trainings, etc.). Monitoring the implementation of legislation and policies is also crucial to identify challenges and bottlenecks as well as the issues faced by beneficiaries of the new legislation.
Therefore, since 2023 UNDP jointly with Ombudsperson of Uzbekistan, has supported selected NGOs to perform analyses of law enforcement and law implementation practice by analyzing the court decisions. During this research more than thousand (1000) court decisions related to divorce cases, deprivation of parental rights cases and cases related to housing disputes were analyzed. This blog ais to highlight the most sensitive findings that reflect the actual situation faced by women when protecting their rights.
Finding #1 – Burdensome legislative provision related to obtaining permissions from former partner regarding international travel of children, results in increased number of parental rights deprivation cases filed by women requiring them to put extra efforts and extra financial burden to enjoy their legislative rights. Such extra efforts can also derive from cases, where courts did not clearly state woman’s custody over the child.
In over 88% of the (191 out of 217 cases) cases on deprivation of parental rights, claimants request court to deprive the parent of parental rights on the ground of article 79 paragraph 1 of the Family code of the Republic of Uzbekistan which is ‘refusing to perform parental obligations including payment of alimony support’.
As per social media groups and activists’ main reason for this is the requirement of the legislation to obtain permission from the parent to allow minors to travel abroad. This requirement could be simplified to ensure women’s rights to effectively exercise custody over minors.
Finding #2 – Right of women to adequate housing is not yet effectively implemented especially of women who are in process of separation with their spouses. This is based on the finding that over 94% mandatory moving in cases (among husband and wife) are filed by women. At the same time, we need to acknowledge that in over 82 % of these cases courts granted to women right to housing in their (former) spouses housing. Yet again, women are put in position where burden of proof is on them and its women who must go through the process of demanding their rights. This finding gets another perspective as these women are the custody holders over the (270) minors.
Finding #3 – Number of cases where litigants are self-represented is huge. Analyses show that in over 51% of the mandatory moving in cases (125 out of 244 cases) and in over 85% deprivation of parental rights cases (186 out of 217 cases) litigants participated without a lawyer. Interesting to note that in deprivation of parental rights cases where litigants participated ‘on their own’ 61% (123 out of 186 cases) were left without consideration and in another 32% (60 out of 186 cases) proceeding were ceased.
These figures evidence the need for further enhancement of availability and accessibility free legal aid services. As the Human Rights Committee explained in its general comment No. 32, “the presence or absence of legal aid will often determine whether a person can access or participate in the relevant proceedings in a meaningful way.”
While UNDP welcomes adoption of policies aimed at provision of state funded legal aid to victims of domestic and gender-based violence (Decree of the President #175) we must also note that effective free legal aid system requires taking additional measures aimed at increasing number of legal aid providers: both lawyers and CSO that provide legal aid. To increase the number of latter, further steps need to be taken to simplify procedures related activities of CSOs in Uzbekistan as well as to allocate additional financial resources to support CSOs.
Finding #4 – Gender disaggregated justice data. We must note insufficiency of the justice statistical data on the accessibility of justice for women. In our 2023 blog on divorce cases, we reported that only 7 out of 497 statistical forms available in all public statistical reports of the Supreme Court contain gender-disaggregated statistics. This number of statistical forms with gender-disaggregated statistical information is insufficient in light of CEDAW's General Recommendation #33 on women's access to justice. To ensure implementation of this recommendation there is a need for systematic analyses of law enforcement practice using such tools like a) analyzing the court decisions and b) court trial monitorings.
The CSOs, activists and independent researchers are deploying the first tool to identify the actual situation with protection of women rights in Uzbekistan by using the publicly available justice data including online database of court decisions. We must note that user-friendliness of the online database of court decisions can be improved further to increase number of independent research on implementation of legislation in practice.
We also need to note that court trial monitorings are not yet fully implemented in Uzbekistan thus leaving this important source of information on actual implementation of legislation related to ensuring gender equality out of focus.
To conclude, while significant steps have been taken in advancing gender equality and promoting women’s rights in Uzbekistan, the findings of the research highlights persisting challenges, where further action is needed. Findings of this research outlined the issues of burdensome legislative procedures along with the lack of adequate free legal aid services and limited available gender-dissegregated data, which suggest the need for systemic improvements in how justice is delivered to women.
Looking forward, UNDP is committed to address those gaps, continue support for legal reforms, and will continue its efforts in increasing public awareness of women’s rights in close cooperation with the government and civil society in Uzbekistan. This includes reducing unnecessary legal procedural barriers for women, significantly improving accessibility of legal aid as well as promoting establishment of comprehensive monitoring mechanisms to ensure fair and effective enforcement/implementation of the law.
Through cooperation, UNDP hopes to contribute to future where the rights of women are upheld, protected and respected at all levels of society.
