Since Uzbek President Shavkat Mirziyoev got here to energy in late 2016, he has typically exhorted journalists to attract consideration to corruption and different issues within the nation. Mirziyoev has promised he would “stand behind” journalists and media shops. Nevertheless, the Uzbek president has been nowhere in sight lately as bloggers within the nation have been arrested and given lengthy jail sentences — in some circumstances longer sentences than individuals in Uzbekistan convicted for violent crimes obtain. Becoming a member of host Bruce Pannier to debate are friends Umida Niyazova, director on the Germany-based Uzbek Discussion board for Human Rights, and Steve Swerdlow, a rights lawyer with a few years of expertise in Central Asia who’s presently an affiliate professor of the apply of human rights on the College of Southern California.