Draft:Hasanboy Burhanov

Hasanboy Burhanov (Hasanboy Burxonov; born 14 December 1970, Namangan district, Namangan region, Uzbek SSR) - is an entrepreneur, advocate for the rights and freedoms of people with disabilities and an Uzbek public and political activist.

One of the leaders of the Uzbek opposition and the founder of the political opposition movement Erkin O’zbekiston (Free Uzbekistan).

Biography
Hasanboy Burhanov was born on December 14, 1970, in the Namangan district of Uzbek SSR, is a person with a disability. He contracted poliomyelitis when he was nine months old and uses mobility aids to walk. In 1986, he graduated from general education boarding school No.100 in Tashkent, Uzbek SSR. In June 1990, he completed his studies at the Mikhailovskiy economic college-boarding school of the Russian SFSR, where he received secondary vocational education in economics and accounting. In August 1990, he entered the Kharkiv Law Institute named after F.E. Dzerzhinsky by correspondence.

Employment history
At the age of 19, Burhanov started his working career in the system of State Supplies of the USSR Gossnab in the Namangan region as a marketing engineer. In the spring of 1993, at the age of 22, he founded a private company called "Angel". Up to the beginning of his public activity, Hasanboy Burhanov worked in various commercial structures.

Public activism
At the end of 2005, he was invited to work in the Uzbek Society for Persons with Disabilities, which was founded on 22 January 1991 by Decree #18 of the Cabinet of Ministers of the Uzbek SSR signed by Islam Karimov. From 2006 to 2008, he worked as the Director of the "Tehnocomtrade" subsidiary of the Uzbek Society for Persons with Disabilities. From 2007 to 2012, he worked as the Chairman of the Tashkent City Branch of the Uzbek Society for Persons with Disabilities. In 2009-2012, he worked as Deputy Chairman of the Uzbek Society for Persons with Disabilities. In 2009 Burhanov established "The Public Foundation for Persons with Disabilities of Uzbekistan", which was registered in the Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Uzbekistan on 28 August 2009 under No. 708.

Criminal case
In 2009, the Tashkent City Prosecutor's Office opened a criminal case against Burhanov. He was charged with acts under article 207(1) (official negligence) and Article 167(3) (embezzlement by theft or misappropriation of funds) of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Uzbekistan. Burhanov's trials lasted for 3.5 years and received publicity. Human rights activists and representatives of the US and UK Embassies who attended and monitored these trials had great doubts about the veracity of the allegations made by the Tashkent City Prosecutor's Office against Hasanboy Burhanov. Burhanov's case is cited in the US Department of State's and the Foreign Office's annual World Human Rights Report 2012.

Political emigration
In early October 2012, after Burhanov's life became in real danger, he left Uzbekistan and applied for political asylum in Germany. On November 14, 2013, the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) granted him political asylum in accordance with paragraph 16 "a" of the Basic Law for the Federal Republic of Germany.

Opposition activity
In September 2019, while attending a Human Rights Meeting organized in Warsaw by the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights, Burhanov appealed to the European Union and the U.S. Government to mediate negotiations between the Uzbek opposition and the Uzbek authorities. In reaction to Burhanov’s speeches at this and the previous OSCE conferences, Uzbekistan National News Agency published an article "Наманганлик фирибгарнинг Варшавадаги васвасаси" (Namangan Swindler's Hysteria in Warsaw).

The material tells how Burhanov caused damage to the state in the amount of 59 million sums. It also states that Burhanov slanders Uzbekistan and its President Shavkat Mirziyoyev, in order to escape criminal responsibility, as well as to obtain the status of a political refugee in Germany. The publication concludes with the statement that "he (Burhanov) must be immediately extradited to Uzbekistan! There is no other way to deal with this issue!" There is a number of other articles about Burhanov on the Internet, with similar threatening content.