By Kayla Lee

The following article was contributed by Isomiddin Ismailov, Professor of the Department of the University of Public safety of the Republic of Uzbekistan; and Sanjar Sharipov, Head of the Department of the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs of the Republic of Uzbekistan Doctor of Philosophy in law sciences, associate professor, to the Diplomacy Journal for publication via the Embassy of Uzbekistan in Seoul. –Ed.

Special attention is paid to ensuring a peaceful and tranquil life of the people, as well as creating a culture of law-abiding and public safety in society within the framework of large-scale reforms implemented in the country during the years of independence.

Essentially new mechanisms and procedures for organizing the affairs in the public safety system based on the principle of “Serving the interests of the people” have been introduced, and targeted interaction between government bodies and civil society institutions has been established by virtue of the reforms implemented over the past seven years.

It is considered that the results of the reforms implemented in the field of public safety can be divided into several directions on the basis of the essence.

The first direction regulates the legal provision of public safety. From the analysis of reforms carried out in the field of public safety in recent years, it is clear that in this process special attention is paid to creating a legal basis for activities based on the requirements of the time. In particular, with the adoption of the laws “On Internal affairs bodies” and “On the National Guard of the Republic of Uzbekistan”, a new substantive stage of reforms in the system began in the country by eliminating gaps, ambiguities and conflicts in the legal field.

The laws of the Republic of Uzbekistan “On countering extremism” (2018), “On emergency situations” (2021), “On cybersecurity” (2022), “On security activities” (2022), “On the protection of population and territories from natural and man-made emergencies” (2022) have been adopted for the purpose of effective legal provision of public safety.

The second direction regulates the improvement of management and organization of activities to ensure public safety. It should be noted that as a result of the reforms, the entire system of ensuring public safety has been radically improved, 85 percent of the personnel of the administrative apparatus have been transferred to lower units, to places directly close to the settlements and thus their proximity with the people has been enabled in this regard.

According to the Resolution of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, completely new mechanisms for organizing the activities of the system of internal affairs bodies have been introduced into the sphere of ensuring public safety, providing for:

firstly, solving the issues directly on the spot of problems regarding crime prevention and the fight against crime by identifying and eliminating the causes of crimes in the context of each makhallas (community), family and individual;

secondly, dividing each district, city and makhalla into categories based on the state of crime in the relevant territory, attracting, together with khokimiyats (local governments), sectors and the public, all the forces and means necessary to eliminate “hotspots of crime”;

thirdly, creating the comprehensive management and continuous control based on the “republic - region - district - makhalla” system;

fourthly, the makhalla law and order centers were formed on the basis of base of internal affairs bodies.

Furthermore, significant work is being done to ensure safe tourism in Uzbekistan as part of the reforms. A unique national system for ensuring safe tourism has been created in accordance with the Decree of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan. 

The third direction is dedicated to the introduction of digitalization in the field of public safety. As part of the ongoing reforms, the implementation of new methods of work to ensure public safety, based on the Concepts of “Safe city”, “Safe capital”, the “Smooth and safe road” system, “Safe apartment”, “Safe home”, the principle of “Safe educational institution” and so forth. 

“Situational centers” are being gradually created to monitor the situation in public places, henceforth video cameras and emergency call buttons are integrated, installed on the streets, in citizens’ homes and social facilities.

Information and reference databases are being gradually introduced into the public safety system, and all document circulations has been transferred to electronic form.

The next direction of reform is to improve the system of training, retraining and advanced training of personnel for the field of public safety. Two extremely important decrees of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan were simultaneously adopted in order to introduce a completely new system of training specialists for bodies responsible for ensuring public safety.

In accordance with the first decree of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, a two-stage system of higher education, consisting of bachelor’s and master’s degrees, was introduced into the training process at the Academy of the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Advanced training Institute of the Ministry of Internal Affairs was given the status of a legal entity and the main directions of its activities were determined, and it was also put into place serving in the internal affairs bodies according to the system of continuous educational and career process.

According to the second decree of the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan, the Military Technical Institute of the National Guard was transformed into the University of Public Safety of the Republic of Uzbekistan and was defined as a basic higher military educational and research institution that provides targeted training of qualified personnel in the field of ensuring public safety. Two-stage system of higher education has been introduced, including bachelor’s and master’s degrees in the process of training professional personnel at the University.

In addition, the University is granted the right to train personnel in full-time bachelor and master degree programs in the field of law, psychology and economics on a general basis with their enrollment as students.

It should be highlighted that the adopted Concept of Public safety of the Republic of Uzbekistan and the Development Strategy of the Public safety system of the Republic of Uzbekistan for 2022-2025 determined the ways and mechanisms for the development and effective implementation of legal, methodological, scientific, organizational measures to introduce a qualitatively new system for ensuring public safety in the country.

In conclusion, it should be mentioned that the goals stipulated in the Development Strategy of New Uzbekistan for 2022 - 2026, as well as in the Strategy “Uzbekistan - 2030” provide for the creation of a completely new national system for ensuring public safety of the Republic of Uzbekistan.