Family law and children’s rights

Family law regulates marriage, parenthood and kinship relations. Children’s rights are also set out in the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child, adopted in 1989; Uzbekistan is a party to it. Under the Convention, everyone under 18 is a child. A child has the right to live and be brought up in a family, to communicate with parents, to a name, to protection and to express their opinion; the opinion is taken into account in matters that directly concern the child. Parents must care for a child’s upbringing, health, education and development; this is both their right and their duty. Able-bodied adult children must care for their parents. A child has own property: gifts, inheritance, personal items and own earnings. Even if parents divorce, the child keeps the right to contact with both, and child support is paid for the child’s material needs. The guardianship authority helps if a child’s rights are violated. Anyone who learns of violence or neglect toward a child should tell an adult; in danger call 102 or 103, and the child helpline can be contacted. Nobody has the right to beat, insult or frighten a child.