The Committee to Protect Journalists, CPJ, has rated Uzbekistan as one of the five worst offending countries for detaining journalists and violating press expression.

NBCentral Asia observers agree with this assessment, and predict that the situation could get even worse.

On December 8, CPJ its annual Prison Census Report for 2008, listing 125 journalists around the world who are in prison because of their professional activities.

Uzbekistan comes fifth on the list, following China, Cuba, Burma and Eritrea.

The report lists Muhammad Bekjonov, editor of the Uzbek opposition newspaper Erk, serving a 14 sentence; Yusuf Ruzimurodov, sentenced to 15 years; Hurriyat freelance journalist Gairat Meliboyev, serving six-and-a-half years; Ortikali Namazov, editor of the Pop Tongi newspaper, with five-and-a-half years; Jamshid Karimov, a former IWPR contributor, who has been forcibly confined to a mental hospital since 2006; and Solijon Abdurahmonov, sentenced to ten years in prison in October 2008.

Over the past few years, Uzbekistan topped various lists that measure repression of free speech. In April, the American group Freedom House published a report on press freedom in which Uzbekistan was among the ten worst countries.

There are no independent media in Uzbekistan. The press is under the total control of the authorities, and journalists are used as an instrument of government propaganda. Those who refuse to comply are persecuted.

"It is dangerous to be a journalist in Uzbekistan because the authorities do not tolerate objectivity, still less criticism", Umida Niazova, a journalist and human rights activist now based in Germany, told NBCentral Asia.

Media experts say the Uzbek authorities are now engaged in a concerted effort to purge society of free-thinkers by forcing journalists who try to write the truth to leave the country, or by imprisoning them.