Exploitation of migrant labour in Kazakhstan
Exploitation of migrant labour in Kazakhstan
18.03.2026
Article published on the azattyqasia.org website
Several Uzbek citizens who worked at the Karima restaurant chain in Astana have complained that the management have not paid them while confiscating their documents. This isn’t the first time the chain has been accused of exploiting foreign workers. A social activist, who provides legal advice to migrants, has described a classic pattern of abuse that often goes unpunished in Kazakhstan.
“If your mother dies, I’ll let you go”
In January his year, a 43-year-old Uzbek woman, Mavlyuda Khaitova, got a job as a cold buffet cook and was promised 10,000 tenge a day (around $20). She was planning to work for a month to save money to pay for medical treatment for her elderly mother, who had stayed behind in Namangan. Two and a half months later, Mavlyuda was still in Kazakhstan.
“Every time I went to my boss to ask for permission to leave, he said “no”. About a month later, I asked for my documents, saying I wanted to leave as I could be deported and then be unable to re-enter the country. Again, he said “no”. “You can’t leave, he said, no-one will deport you while I’m here. The police are under my control and won’t force you to leave”.
I agreed to work for a little longer. I approached him again and said “I have to leave, please let me go – my mother is ill”. And he replied “my mother’s sick too. Your mother hasn’t died – if she does, I’ll let you leave”.
Mavlyuda says she is not the only one to have suffered as a result of the restaurant management’s actions.
Shavkat Tursunov, a fellow 50-year-old countryman of Mavlyuda’s, baked flatbreads at the café. He says his sister used to work at the Karima. When she wanted to return home, she was told that someone would have to come in to replace her. She asked her brother for help.
“I was working in Tomsk at the time, then returned home for a while before coming to Kazakhstan. My sister had explained everything to me beforehand, saying that they take away your documents under the pretext of processing and legalising them. They promise to pay you on time but never do. They don’t register anything and threaten you if you tell them you want to leave, saying “We’ll hand you over to the police and they’ll arrest you”. This is how they blackmail you. I came here knowing all this and just had one goal in mind – to get my sister out. I thought I’d think of something”, said Tursunov.
Shavkat has an 80-year-old father who is blind, as well as a wife and children back in Uzbekistan. Before coming to Astana, he spent three years working on a construction site in Russia. He never expected he would find himself in such a hopeless situation in Kazakhstan. He works a 13-hour day, shifts don’t end until after midnight and his pay is constantly delayed.
“On paper, my salary is 12,000 tenge. In reality, there is a wait of between a month and a half to two months before my wages are paid. It’s crucial for us to get paid on time. If wages aren’t paid, passports are taken away, which is wrong. A person has the right to leave whenever they choose. There are a lot of people who are in the same boat as me”, says Tursunov.
Asadbek Turdaliev also speaks about being treated like a slave at work. He started working at the Karima restaurant last October, believing the management’s promises that he could return home at any time. The 27-year old planned to save up for his wedding. He was paid for the first two months, after which the payments stopped and his passport never returned to him.
“I received my money in January. I asked for 200,000 tenge, which was only given to me after a great deal of wrangling. February and March passed. They wouldn’t give me what I’d earned through my own labour. I wasn’t looking for a loan, only what was due to me”, he said.
The Uzbeks are convinced that the restaurant chain’s management never put their employment on a legal footing. They believe their documents were confiscated to prevent them from moving freely around the city and to keep them tied to their workplaces.
“Whenever there was an inspection by the authorities, the boss would take us out of the café for about five or six minutes and hide us. Only after the inspectors had gone would we return to work”, said Asadbek.
“This is exploitation”
Azattyk’s reporters in Astana went to the Karima restaurant to meet the management, who declined to meet them. However, the restaurant manager, Saparbay Torekulov, did speak to the journalists over the ‘phone and flatly rejected the claims made by the Uzbek workers.
He said that “the migrants bring their passports to the main desk when the police arrive to make their inspection. They bring these with them, then take them away themselves; no-one has confiscated their documents. I haven’t got them. They can come and collect their wages, nobody’s pressuring them. They leave on schedule; we bought tickets for some for the 18th and others for the 1st and have planned their work accordingly. They’ll work their shifts and leave”. He claims that workers are paid on time and in full and denies that migrants are hidden during inspections.
The Karima restaurant has been at the centre of accusations of worker exploitation in the past. In 2023, several Uzbek nationals said they had worked there for longer than their pre-agreed terms and received less than was promised. On their arrival in Kazakhstan, their employer took away their passports and refused to return them. Some reported that male restaurant workers had beaten and threatened them.
Later, with the help of the Korgau Foundation, the Uzbek nationals filed a complaint with the police but, according to their lawyer, progress on their case was slow. The police said that criminal proceedings had been initiated with the charge of “arbitrariness” as set out under Kazakhstan’s Criminal Code. However, after Karima’s management returned the migrants’ passports and paid them what they were owed, the Uzbeks were able to return to their homeland.
Anna Ryl, Head of the Korgau Foundation, says that human trafficking continues to go unpunished in the country. She says that the number of exploitation cases could be reduced if they were investigated as human trafficking, rather than arbitrary actions, or violations of immigration laws, and if those responsible are severely punished.
“If your passport is taken away, that’s a sign of human trafficking. If someone takes advantage of that and forces you to work in some way – that’s exploitation. Our immigration laws don’t adequately protect the rights of foreign workers. Here, it is assumed that migrants are to blame. Our President says we must combat human trafficking and labour law violations, yet things like this are still happening at the grassroots level”, says Anna.
The Korgau Foundation helped the Uzbek citizens register a complaint against the Karima management chain. According to Anna Ryl, officers from the police’s anti-trafficking response unit met senior Karima bosses, after which the employees’ passports were returned to them. The management promised to pay the migrants.
Under Kazakh legislation, when hiring a foreign worker, employers must complete the necessary paperwork, provide an employment contract, register the worker and make contributions on their behalf, including medical insurance payments. The State fee for one foreign worker can range from 13,000 to 27,000 tenge. Working without a legal permit risks deportation and a five-year entry ban.
As of last October, 185,000 migrant workers were registered in Kazakhstan, the majority of whom were employed in low-skilled and physically demanding jobs.
On 17 March, Azattyk Asia posted a video on its social media accounts featuring Uzbeks who spoke openly about their treatment by the Karima management. The Uzbekistan Government’s Migration Agency reported that five migrants who had worked there had been paid their wages, including Mavlyuda, Shavkat and Asadbek.
A US State Department report states that the Kazakh Government does not fully comply with the minimum requirements for combating human trafficking, although it is making efforts to do so. Despite the adoption of a National Action Plan for 2024-2026, the authorities don’t always investigate such cases. The report recommends that the definition of human trafficking under Kazakhstan’s Criminal Code be brought in line with international law, as well as actively identifying victims among vulnerable groups, including foreign nationals, that these crimes are investigated and to ensure traffickers are properly punished.
Manshuk Asautai
