Uzbekistan's Senate backs life sentences for raping children under 14

Uzbekistan's Senate has approved a child-protection law that makes the rape of a child under 14 punishable by life imprisonment. Senators voted on Oct. 2 for amendments that also remove time limits on prosecuting the gravest sexual crimes against children and add new safeguards for young victims and witnesses, Asia Plus and Gazeta.uz reported. The law will take effect once it is signed by the president, both outlets said.

Under the current criminal code, rape of a child under 14 and other forcible sexual acts against children of that age carry 15 to 20 years in prison. The approved text replaces that range with a sentence of up to 25 years or life, according to the reports.

What the law changes

The package goes well beyond longer prison terms. Its main provisions, as reported by Asia Plus, Gazeta.uz and Caspian Post, are:

• No statute of limitations: neither prosecution nor enforcement of a sentence will lapse with time for particularly serious crimes against the sexual integrity of children.
• Free legal help: child victims of violence will be entitled to a state-funded lawyer from the very first procedural step.
• Recorded interviews: questioning of minor victims must be filmed, and face-to-face confrontations between children and suspects will be restricted.
• Workplace bans: school and kindergarten employees convicted of violence against children will lose their jobs and face limits on where they can work.
• No early release: people convicted of intentional crimes that result in a child's death will not be eligible for suspended sentences or parole.

The numbers behind the vote

Abdulhakim Eshmuratov, who chairs the Senate Committee on Judicial and Legal Issues, presented crime data to senators, Gazeta.uz reported. Cases under Part 4 of Article 118 of the criminal code, which covers the rape of a child under 14, rose from 85 in 2022 to 108 in 2023 and 129 in 2024, before easing to 123 in 2025. Cases under Part 4 of Article 119, which deals with other forcible sexual acts against that age group, went from 144 in 2022 to 163 in 2023 and 170 in 2024, then fell to 116 last year.

Gazeta.uz linked the reforms to a case in September involving a kindergarten employee in the Uchkurgan district of Namangan region. On Sept. 27, Saida Mirziyoyeva, head of the Presidential Administration, said accountability should extend beyond the people directly responsible to those who allowed the incident to happen, the outlet reported.

The amendments place much of the new burden on institutions rather than only on offenders. Schools and kindergartens face direct employment consequences when staff are convicted, and investigators will have to adapt to recording requirements and to providing lawyers for children from the start of a case. Those procedural pieces are likely to determine how the law works in practice, because they shape whether children and families come forward and whether cases hold up in court.

What it means

Tashkent is using life imprisonment to signal that crimes against young children will be treated as a top-tier priority, and the speed of the response shows how quickly a single case can push child safety up the political agenda when the presidential administration engages publicly. Life terms and the end of time limits may grab headlines, but the more durable change could come from the quieter provisions on legal aid, recorded testimony and workplace bans, which target the gaps that keep abuse cases from being reported or prosecuted. The official figures, which show some categories falling in 2025 after several years of increases, will give lawmakers and rights monitors a baseline for judging whether the tougher regime makes a measurable difference.