The Legislative Chamber at a plenary session on October 25 immediately passed the Conflict of Interest Bill in the second and third readings. Now it must be considered by the Senate.

The document is focused on the mechanisms for preventing and regulating conflicts of interest related to the activities of state bodies and their employees.

Sharofiddin Nazarov, chairman of the Committee on Budget and Economic Reforms, said the scope of the bill was much broader than that of similar regulations in other countries. In particular, the bill will also cover joint-stock companies with state shares and companies where there is a share of such JSCs (with a government stake), as well as organizations that enter into relations with them. “If necessary, we go down [in coverage] to public procurement limited liability companies,” he said.

The Bill has defined the concepts of "conflict of interest", "related persons", "personal interests", "close relatives". Related parties are legal entities whose stakes or shares of the authorized fund (charter capital) (excluding up to 10% of shares in public circulation) are owned or members of the management body and supervisory board by employees of state organizations and (or) their relatives.

The Bill defines the tasks of authorized bodies in the field of preventing conflicts of interest in the activities of state structures: the Anti-Corruption Agency, ethics commissions, personnel departments and internal anti-corruption structures in government organizations.

Akmal Burkhanov, director of the Anti-Corruption Agency, said that the agency had identified thousands of cases of conflicts of interest in the civil service.

“However, until now there have been difficulties in eliminating conflicts of interest due to the fact that there has been no legal framework for regulating conflicts of interest or liability for it. As mentioned earlier, the passing of the law will serve to eliminate the risks of corruption in state bodies, and most importantly, to prevent nepotism and friendship in the public service wrte.

115 MPs voted in favour of the bill, 1 voted against, 2 abstained, and 4 deputies did not vote.

Back in June 2020, by presidential decree, the Anti-Corruption Agency, together with other state bodies, was instructed to develop a draft Declaring income, property and conflict of interest of civil servants law within three months, but the law on declaring income has not yet been adopted.