Maksim Popov

This social worker, activist in risk reduction in drug and sexuality (transmission of AIDS, HIV and hepatitis) has circulated brochures, explaining to young and old alike people, why to use condoms for sex, and why to use steril syringes and clean equipment for injecting drugs like heroin, very fashionable in this country (Uzbekistan) because, among other reasons, its proximity to Afghanistan which is a notorious producer of poppy, the plant used to produces opiates.

What is good to know here, is that the head of Uzbekistan for over 20 years (since the fall of the USSR, "elected" with 86% of the vote, and a second "election" in 1995 gave him 100% of the vote...), the dictator Islom Karimov, directly involved in heroin trafficking, oppresses the people mercilessly. His government banned the use and the sale of sterile syringes for drug addicts, and prefers to force an entire segment of the population to be sterilized, (only the poorest, who still represent the majority of the people) without asking their opinion, or even telling them : after the first child, obstetricians Uzbeks have to sterilize women, otherwise they face to retaliation (fines, pressure, prison). These acts, like torture practicing by the Uzbek authorities, but also the censorship of the Press, are denounced by the United Nations, NGOs and activists in the field of Human Rights.

The imprisonment of Maksim Popov has remained silent over the world, evidence of complicity of other countries about the presidential dictatorship, or at least a blindness of these countries. One reason for this, is the dark alliance between the U.S. government and Uzbekistan to fight against Afghanistan.

British diplomat Craig Murray wrote an article calling on all people who feel affected by what is happening in this forgotten part of the world, to write to their Member of Parliament, to inform them of the injustice faced by Maksim Popov. It is this appeal that we relay here.