Law “On State Secrets” approved to strengthen national security

On December 27, Uzbekistan adopted the Law "On State Secrets," setting the legal and organizational framework for the classification, use, and protection of sensitive information in the interests of national security.

The law outlines the responsibilities and procedures for designating information as state secrets, ensuring its safeguarding, and declassifying it when necessary. The President of Uzbekistan determines the unified state policy in this area, while the State Security Service is designated as the primary body overseeing the law's implementation.

Under the law, information can be classified or declassified according to a predetermined list of subjects eligible for protection. Heads of organizations handling state secrets bear personal responsibility for classifying sensitive information.

The legislation introduces three levels of confidentiality for state secrets, each with corresponding labels:

• Special Importance – the highest level of privacy,
• Top Secret – the second level,
• Secret – the third level.

The confidentiality of information will last no longer than 30 years for state-level secrets and 10 years for official-level secrets.

The law, passed by the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis in August and approved by the Senate on October 23 during its fifty-ninth plenary session, will take effect three months after its official publication.

This marks the first significant update to Uzbekistan’s legal framework on state secrets since the adoption of the "Law on the Protection of State Secrets" on May 7, 1993.