Feedback ADC Memorial and Bir Duino–Kyrgyzstan report was created on the eve of the UN Universal Periodic Review, which Kyrgyzstan will proceed in 2025. Human rights defenders draw attention to the insufficient state efforts of Kyrgyzstan to protect its citizens abroad and to create conditions for effective employment at home. The report was presented on November 27, 2024 in Almaty at the Regional Expert Seminar of representatives of civil society organizations of Central Asia on the preparation of key recommendations for the upcoming OSCE Ministerial Conference in Malta.
Overcoming the dependence of Kyrgyzstan’s economy on external labor migration was one of the election promises of the current government, but so far hundreds of thousands of Kyrgyzstanis go abroad to earn money, mainly to Russia.
Russia‘s migration policy is invariably escalating and harsh, which is in contradiction with the real need and interest of the Russian public and private sector in migrant labor. In this regard, Kyrgyzstan does not persist in generally improving migration rules for its citizens, preferring to seek only small privileges and temporary measures (such as, for example, amnesty for those migrants who have been blacklisted and cannot enter Russia for this reason, or creation of “separate corridors“ in migration centers).
On the background of the war against Ukraine, in recent years the migration legislation and practices of the Russian Federation have undergone another round of tightening. In 2024, Russia legislatively introduced a special regime for the expulsion of migrant violators, which significantly restricts their rights. In the first half of 2024, the courts decided to expel about 86 thousand foreigners from Russia, 124 thousand administrative cases of violation of migration rules were submitted to the courts – which is close to the data for the whole of 2022 (data from the Judicial Department at the Supreme Court of the Russian Federation, “Important Stories“, October 21, 2024). The Russian authorities, often represented by the most senior officials, condone manifestations of racism and support xenophobes. Law enforcement agencies that regularly conduct anti-migrant raids are willing to attract activists of nationalist movements to them, delegating to them the right to violence. Migrant children become hostages in a situation where anti-migrant sentiments are articulated by both the authorities and nationalist activists on the ground and result in open violence, hate speech, and harassment.
These recent trends have also not caused a proper reaction from the Kyrgyzstan authorities, who limit themselves to periodic punctual statements that the preferences of migrants from Kyrgyzstan related to the country‘s membership in the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) should be maintained (for example, the speech of the head of the Cabinet of Ministers Akylbek Dzhaparov at a meeting of the Eurasian Intergovernmental Council (Yerevan, October 2024). A very reasonable recommendation of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kyrgyzstan not to travel to Russia without good reason, given to Kyrgyzstan citizens on September 5, 2024 (against the background of increased anti-migrant sentiment in Russia, frequent anti-migrant raids by law enforcement agencies, xenophobic speeches by politicians) is in fact impossible, since hundreds of thousands of Kyrgyzstanis are constantly on the territory of the Russian Federation, unable to fully earn money at home.
Serious violations of the rights of migrant children are of particular concern. In the wake of anti-migrant sentiments, a bill was introduced to the State Duma to ban the admission of migrant children to educational organizations without confirming knowledge of the Russian language and the legality of staying in the territory of Russia. Such initiatives grossly violate not only the Constitution of the Russian Federation, but also the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child. They need a clear and decisive reaction from the Kyrgyzstan authorities and must be stopped.
The other risks are also related to Russia‘s war against Ukraine: involvement of migrants in mercenary activities under contract with the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation or private military companies, coercion of newly naturalized citizens to serve in the Russian army, potential statelessness (deprivation of Russian citizenship for evading military service, desertion, surrender, “discrediting the army“). According to open data, it was revealed that at least 51 Kyrgyzstan natives died in Ukraine, 25 of them were Kyrgyzstan citizens (Azattyk and Mediazona investigation, October 30, 2024). These data cannot be considered exhaustive, and the actual death toll may be much higher. As far as can be judged from open sources, the Kyrgyz authorities do not have all the information about the citizens of the country involved in the war with Ukraine, including the dead.
The authors of the report draw attention to the fact that reducing the scale of labor migration, which is largely feminized in Kyrgyzstan, is hindered, in particular, by the presence of professional prohibitions on women‘s labor in the legislation of Kyrgyzstan (the so–called list of prohibited professions). Since 2017, civil society has been advocating for the abolition of such lists in the region, human rights defenders, trade unions and government agencies such as the Ministry of Labor, Social Security and Migration have conducted a constructive dialogue in recent years and prepared proposals to improve the situation. The UN CEDAW made recommendations on the revision of the list of prohibited professions and the amendment of the Labor Code (80th session, 2021).
Only in 2024, a draft of a new Labor Code was submitted to the Jogorku Kenesh, in which it is planned to revise the list of 446 prohibited professions and leave temporary restrictions only for pregnant women and nursing mothers. As of today, the draft was adopted by the Jogorku Kenesh in the first reading (October 2024), its final version has not yet been presented to the public.
The authors of the report address the following recommendations to the Kyrgyzstan authorities:
- Adopt comprehensive anti-discrimination legislation.
- Take effective legislative and practical measures to protect the rights of migrant workers abroad, paying special attention to ensuring the right of children to education without discrimination. In particular, to counteract the adoption of laws in Russia that violate the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child and restrict access to schooling for migrant children.
- Take effective measures to prevent the participation of Kyrgyzstan citizens in armed conflicts abroad, in particular, in Russia‘s war against Ukraine.
- Create better conditions for the employment of women in Kyrgyzstan without discrimination, in particular:
– To abolish all professional prohibitions for women and ensure gender equality in the field of employment, at the same time providing temporary protection measures for pregnant and lactating women;
– Open up opportunities for training and employment of women in previously prohibited jobs, promote gender equality in the field of employment through extensive information campaigns.