The Law of the Republic of Uzbekistan dated November 05, 2019 No. ZRU-379 approved changes to the liability procedure for violation of the rules of temporary stay in Uzbekistan.

The Law of the Republic of Uzbekistan dated November 05, 2019 No. ZRU-379 approved changes to the liability procedure for violation of the rules of temporary stay in Uzbekistan.

Changes to the legislation are aimed at liberalizing liability for violation of the rules of stay in Uzbekistan and have been realized in accordance with the implementation of the Strategy of Action for the five priority areas of development of the Republic of Uzbekistan in 2017 - 2021, as well as ongoing reforms to develop the tourism sector and create conveniences for travelers.

The relevance of the changes is justified by the following main factors:

1) A study of the criminal law of a number of foreign countries revealed the absence of criminal liability for violations of the rules of stay;

For reference: an analysis of the experience of foreign countries showed that the legislation of a number of foreign states, such as the Russian Federation, Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus, the USA, EU countries, Turkey, Singapore does not provide for criminal liability for violations of the rules of stay.

Criminal liability for violation of the rules of stay is established only by the legislation of the People's Republic of China. In other countries, administrative liability is established for violation of the rules of stay, in the form of a fine, expulsion or a ban on entry for a specified period.

2) Analysis of national legislation and statistics on offenses related to violations of the rules of stayin the Republic of Uzbekistan shows the need for differentiation of administrative responsibility measures for citizens of the Republic of Uzbekistan, foreign citizens and stateless persons.

For reference: for example, in 2016, 6,256 people were brought to administrative responsibility, 4,079 of which were foreign citizens, in 2017, 6,006 people, 3,817 of which were foreign citizens and in 2018, 5,764 people, 4,101 of which were foreign citizens.

For violation of the rules of the passport system, citizens of the Republic of Uzbekistan are fined from 1/2 to three Base Estimate Values (BEVs), while foreign citizens and stateless persons permanently residing in the Republic of Uzbekistan are fined from fifty to one hundred BEVs, the principles of equality and humanism are violated.

The size of fines for violation of the rules of stay in the Republic of Uzbekistan ranges from fifty to one hundred BEVs, and therefore, there is an urgent need to reduce the size of fines several times.

3) According to the previous procedure, the consideration of cases related to violation of the rules of stay was carried out by administrative courts, the term of consideration of which is from 3 to 7 days, which in turn does not correspond to the goals and objectives of the reforms being carried out in the country to increase tourism potential and improve the image of a positive image of the country, which required amendments to the legislation to ensure prompt consideration of this category of cases by authorized state bodies.

Given the foregoing, the changes include:

1) exclusion of liability for violations of the rules of stay from the Criminal Code of the Republic of Uzbekistan, i.e. violation of the rules of stay is transferred from criminal to administrative responsibility;

2) improvement of administrative penalties in the form of a significant reduction in the size of the fine. In order to implement the principles of equality of citizens before the law, humanism and justice, the issue of holding foreign citizens and stateless persons accountable for violation of the rules of stay in the republic is differentiated, that is, classified according to violations of the terms of illegal stay in the country: 

3) in addition, bringing to administrative responsibility for violation of the rules of stay passes from administrative courts to the competence of the authorized body (internal affairs bodies), which ensures the efficiency and reduction of bureaucratic processes.