Abdusaid Kuchimov

Abdusaid Kuchimov was born on 15 May 1951 in the Urgut district of the Samarkand region. He finished School No. 37 in Urgut in 1967 and in 1968–1972 studied at the Faculty of Uzbek Language and Literature of the Nizami Tashkent State Pedagogical Institute.

He began working in 1972 as a proofreader at the Oʻqituvchi publishing house. Six months later he joined the republican children’s newspaper “Lenin uchquni” as a staff writer, and until 1984 he served there as head of a department and executive secretary. In 1984–1987 he was executive secretary of the magazine “Sharq yulduzi”, and in 1987–1991 editor-in-chief of “Lenin uchquni”.

His first book, “Kashfiyotchi bolalar” (“Child Inventors”), appeared in 1978; it was followed by “My Uzbekistan”, “The Stone Eagle”, “My Star”, “Chanoq”, “Halqa”, “Two Springs”, “Trees of Hope”, “Qiyofa”, “High Mountains” and other books of poetry, prose and journalism. His writing deals with the lives and characters of village children, the place of children in society and the difficulties of bringing them up. He translated the Tatar writer M. Kharisov’s tale “A Journey to the Red Planet” into Uzbek. He received the international UNESCO prize for his articles on nature conservation and the Gʻafur Gʻulom prize for “Halqa”; feature films have been made from his tale “High Mountains” and his story “Boychechak”.

Kuchimov was a deputy of the Supreme Council of Uzbekistan in 1990–1994 and of the Oliy Majlis in 1994–1999 and 1999–2004. In 1991–1997 he held posts as deputy chairman of the Writers’ Union of Uzbekistan, head of a department of the Cabinet of Ministers, deputy chairman of the national television and radio company, and head of the information centre of the Office of the President. From 1997 to 2005 he chaired the National Television and Radio Company of Uzbekistan; in 2005–2006 he was its deputy chairman and director general of the “Tashkent” channel.

Since July 2006 he has been editor-in-chief of the newspaper “Xabar”. On 10 August 2017 he was appointed director general of the National News Agency of Uzbekistan (UzA). In November 2024 the President appointed him a member of the Senate of the Oliy Majlis, and he has continued to head the agency in that role.

He was awarded the “Shuhrat” medal (1994), received the honorary title Honoured Journalist of the Republic of Uzbekistan (1997) and the Order of “Mehnat shuhrati” (1999), and also holds the title Honoured Youth Mentor of the Republic of Uzbekistan. He turned 75 in May 2026.