In the Andijan region of Uzbekistan, a major land fraud scheme has been uncovered. According to the State Security Service, the chairman of a mahalla (neighborhood committee) in the Andijan district and his deputy (assistant to the khokim) conspired to illegally sell state-owned land plots.

The suspects planned to register 2 sotiks (0.02 hectares) of land allocated for livestock farming and 28 sotiks (0.28 hectares) from the state reserve — a total of 30 sotiks (0.3 hectares) — in the name of a 37-year-old resident of Andijan. They promised to reclassify part of the land as non-residential and the remainder as residential.

For the land, they demanded $57,000, plus an additional $3,000 for processing documents through their contacts in the cadastral authorities. The total illegal transaction was valued at $60,000.

The mahalla chairman and the deputy governor were arrested red-handed while receiving $28,000 for the land and $3,000 for the cadastral paperwork. The remaining sum was to be collected later.

A criminal case has been opened for fraud and abuse of office. Investigative actions are underway, and authorities are checking whether the suspects were involved in other similar crimes.

Source: kun.uz