The protection of the rights and legitimate interests of minors in our country, the creation of all conditions for the upbringing of their harmoniously developed personalities is one of the priorities of state policy.

According to the legislation of the Republic of Uzbekistan, persons under the age of 18 are considered minors. With the adoption of the updated Constitution of the Republic of Uzbekistan, constitutional guarantees for the protection of the rights of minors have been further strengthened in our country.

Although the criminal legislation defines the responsibility of minors, a special procedure for assigning punishment to them, however, there is no special procedure for the repayment of their criminal record, in particular, there is no separate provision for the repayment of a criminal record for a crime committed at a minor age.

Proceeding from this, in order to eliminate these shortcomings, the draft law "On amendments and additions to Articles 77 and 85 of the Criminal Code of the Republic of Uzbekistan in connection with further liberalization of criminal liability against minors" was considered in the first reading at the next plenary session of the Legislative Chamber of the Oliy Majlis.

As noted, the tasks of the Criminal Code are the protection of a person, his rights and freedoms, the interests of society and the state, property, the natural environment, peace, human security from criminal aggression, as well as the prevention of crimes, education of citizens in the spirit of compliance with the norms of the Constitution and the laws of the Republic.

In order to fulfill these tasks, the Code defines the grounds and principles of responsibility, identifies which socially dangerous acts are crimes, defines punishment and other legal measures that can be applied to persons who have committed socially dangerous acts.

The Criminal Code is based on the principles of legality, equality of citizens before the law, democracy, humanity, justice, responsibility for guilt, and the inevitability of responsibility.

A criminal record is a legal condition of a person caused by the fact of his conviction for a crime committed. A person is considered to be convicted from the date of entry into legal force of the guilty verdict, which has been sentenced. A person released from punishment by the court is not considered to be convicted.

In connection with the expiration of the term of the criminal record or the removal of the criminal record, all its legal consequences are annulled, and also if the repayment of the criminal record is determined by the serving of the sentence for the crime committed, the person is not recognized as convicted.

The proposed draft law defines that in order to ensure that the consequences of a sentence served for a crime committed at the age of a minor do not affect the further life of a person and for the beginning of his new life, a person who has served a sentence for a crime committed at a minor age is not recognized as a convicted person.

Also, the minimum term of imprisonment for minors is reduced from 6 months to 1 month. Accordingly, amendments and additions are being made to the Criminal Code of the Republic of Uzbekistan.

The adoption of the draft law will further liberalize the criminal responsibility of minors, will allow a person to get rid of the stigma of being "convicted" for a crime committed before adulthood, and start his life anew.

The draft law was adopted by deputies.