Uzbekistan is a former Soviet state in Central Asia. America vacated an air base in Uzbekistan in 2005.
Uzbekistan hosted a summit in April 2025 for European Union leaders to meet Central Asian presidents, prompting Sergey Lavrov, Russia's foreign minister, to fly in and castigate the EU for supposedly interfering in Central Asia's internal affairs and stoking an anti-Russian agenda. Central Asian states have been welcoming overtures from states hostile to Russia amid competition over trade routes and resources such as energy and the rare earths that abound in the region.
Uzbekistan's car market is one of the most homogeneous in the world. Of the 430,000 cars sold in the country in 2025, 83% were Chevrolets. The Cobalt saloon accounted for nearly a third; the Damas, a loaf-shaped minivan, for a quarter. This dominance is the result of industrial policy. In 1992 Islam Karimov, Uzbekistan's post-communist dictator, decided to build a car industry and partnered with Daewoo, a South Korean firm. After Daewoo went bust following the Asian financial crisis of 1997-98, General Motors, Chevrolet's owner, stepped in. Karimov protected the industry with tariffs of 100% or higher. GM sold its stake in 2019 but a deal permits UzAuto Motors, a state company, to keep making the cars.
Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who succeeded Karimov after his death in 2016, has cut tariffs on electric vehicles to reduce pollution. In 2024 5% of cars sold in Uzbekistan were EVs, up from almost none in 2022; some 90% of those were Chinese. In 2024 BYD opened a factory in Jizzakh, the region of Mirziyoyev's birth. Tashkent's air quality was six times worse than the level the World Health Organisation deems safe in 2024.
Uzbekistan has signed bilateral guest-worker deals across Europe. The strategy is bearing fruit: the central bank recorded $8.2bn in remittances in the first half of 2025, up from $6.5bn in the same period of 2024. That is sizeable for a country with a GDP of $132bn.
I feel much better, now that I've given up hope. Ashleigh Brilliant -- Ashleigh Brilliant