Every year for their entire history, the governments of Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan have systematically coerced their own citizens to cultivate and pick cotton, with the profits benefiting the government elite rather than the people. To harvest cotton last year, the Uzbek government forced over a million citizens to the fields, and the Turkmen government forced tens of thousands. Since neither government has changed its cotton production system it is inevitable that government-orchestrated forced labor will continue this harvest season, in violation of national and international law. In Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, the world’s fifth and seventh-largest cotton exporters, the annual harvests began this week. Here are five key issues to monitor:

This is a guest post from Open Society Foundations, a long-time ILRF partner in the Cotton Campaign to end forced labor in Uzbekistan's cotton harvest, to commemorate the 10-year anniversary of the Andijan Massacre in Uzbekistan. For more on this tragic event, please watch this chilling video from Human Rights Watch, another ally in the Cotton Campaign. ILRF partner Uzbek-German Forum for Human Rights has also posted pieces in both French and Russian.