To ask the Secretary of State for Foreign and Commonwealth Affairs what assessment he has made of the extent of implementation by the Government of Uzbekistan of the recommendations by the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture.

Many of the recommendations remain to be addressed but we have seen some progress which has been mostly in terms of developing legislation.

Recommendation B: Definition of Torture. The Supreme Court resolution 17 of December 2003 defined torture. The definition is that of the UN Convention Against Torture. The definition is not yet on the statute. The Interior Ministry (MVD) has told us they are prosecuting officials in accordance with the new definition anyway.

Recommendation E: Independent investigation of all allegations of torture. This recommendation says all allegations should be independently investigated. The Uzbek authorities permitted independent investigation of the death in custody of Andrei Shelkavenko in May 2004 and in January 2005 have agreed to allow a US pathologist access in the investigation of the death in custody of Samandar Umarov. Torture was disproved in the Shelkavenko case. But there are still many more cases of alleged torture which are not yet being independently investigated.

Recommendation O: Training for law enforcement agents regarding rights of those deprived of liberty. This has improved through projects implemented by the UN Development Programme and the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe with MVD investigators and the penitentiary system.

We recently received an update on activities implemented under the Uzbek National Action Plan on Torture through which Uzbekistan intends to carry out the recommendations of the UN Special Rapporteur. We are looking at this latest update with our EU partners to consider how we can work with the Uzbek Government to achieve further progress.