Uzbeks voted for parliament on Sunday in a poll that drew sharp criticism from Europe's top election watchdog after opposition groups were barred from participating.
Responding to the criticism from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), President Islam Karimov said: "The OSCE cannot have the exclusive right to assess elections."
The OSCE, which sent 21 observers, has said Uzbekistan provided insufficient conditions for a democratic vote.
The OSCE said its presence should not be construed as a sign that the vote was legitimate.
After casting his ballot on Sunday at a polling station in the capital, Tashkent, Karimov said the OSCE, of which Uzbekistan is a member, "represents Europe while we're in Central Asia."
Uzbekistan has hosted US troops near its border with Afghanistan since 2001. But Washington has cut aid to the country, citing its lack of progress on democratic reforms.
"OSCE observers don't like the calm situation in which the elections are held and they are surprised why there's no fierce competition," Karimov said, defending the inactive campaigns of the candidates, all of whom represent the five parties loyal to Karimov.
None of Uzbekistan's four small opposition groups are formally recognized. They said authorities rejected their registration requests.
Some opposition parties urged voters to boycott the elections.
After polls closed at 8pm, election officials said turnout had been 85.1 percent, far more than the 33 percent minimum required to make the poll valid. The Central Election Commission said no irregularities were reported.
Karimov said on Sunday that the country had no "real" opposition and that the existing opposition groups had no popular support.
Leader of the opposition Erk Party, Atonazar Arifov, said Sunday's poll showed that "the government doesn't want either democratic rule or free elections with real competition."
The vote caps a year of growing public discontent over the lack of freedoms in this former Soviet republic and a series of deadly attacks blamed on radical Islamic groups.
The few voters who trickled into polling stations in Tashkent expressed cynicism, and many appeared to have ignored the vote altogether.
Four people jailed in the landmark Hong Kong national security trial of "47 democrats" accused of conspiracy to commit subversion were freed today after more than four years behind bars, the second group to be released in a month. Among those freed was long-time political and LGBTQ activist Jimmy Sham (岑子杰), who also led one of Hong Kong’s largest pro-democracy groups, the Civil Human Rights Front, which disbanded in 2021. "Let me spend some time with my family," Sham said after arriving at his home in the Kowloon district of Jordan. "I don’t know how to plan ahead because, to me, it feels
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
DENIAL: Musk said that the ‘New York Times was lying their ass off,’ after it reported he used so much drugs that he developed bladder problems Elon Musk on Saturday denied a report that he used ketamine and other drugs extensively last year on the US presidential campaign trail. The New York Times on Friday reported that the billionaire adviser to US President Donald Trump used so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that he developed bladder problems. The newspaper said the world’s richest person also took ecstasy and mushrooms, and traveled with a pill box last year, adding that it was not known whether Musk also took drugs while heading the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) after Trump took power in January. In a