Gulnara Karimova, the 38-year-old daughter of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, lives in Geneva, where she serves as Uzbekistan’s Permanent Representative to the UN. Bilan magazine, named her as one of Switzerland’s 10 richest women, estimating her fortune at around $600m in December 2009.
Human Rights groups accuse Uzbek authorities of systematic torture, forced labour in its cotton industry, and repression of political opposition. Most prominent groups, such as Human Rights Watch and Amnesty International, have long been expelled from the country.
UN Representative Ms Karimova presented “Guli” line of Uzbek-inflected fashion last Friday at New York Fashion Week. Ms Karimova told fashion reporters. “We’ve been showing in Milan and we had a lot of interest in Europe.”
She launched her Guli jewellery line for Swiss jewellery maker Chopard last year, although the ensuing controversy caused Chopard to pull out of the launch event at the last minute.
But her father Mr. Karimov, Uzbek President and Mr Ban, Secretary-General during their talks today at UN Headquarters in New York, discussed wider issues affected Central Asian peace and security, particularly terrorism and the illegal drug trade.
Mr. Ban and Islam Karimov also discussed the humanitarian situation in Kyrgyzstan, which neighbours Uzbekistan. Many people were killed in the April clashes between ethnic Kyrgyz and Uzbeks, and United Nations aid agencies have since warned that without an injection of funding from donors, the humanitarian needs of people displaced by the unrest will go unmet.