Ruben Safarov

Ruben Akopovich Safarov was born on 16 November 1930 in Andijan. He trained as a lawyer in Moscow, graduating from the university’s law faculty in 1953, and began his working life as an auditor at the Andijan regional justice department.

Journalism became his main profession. From 1953 Safarov worked on the regional newspaper Andizhanskaya Pravda, rising from staff writer and head of department to deputy editor, and in 1964–1972 he was its editor-in-chief. In 1963 he defended his candidate’s dissertation, and in 1971 he was awarded the Order of the Red Banner of Labour.

In 1972–1979 he was deputy head of the propaganda and agitation department of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Uzbekistan, and until 1988 first deputy chairman of the State Press Committee. In those years he defended his doctoral dissertation (1982) and was given the title of professor (1983).

In 1988–1996 Safarov headed the Russian-language newspaper Pravda Vostoka. Alongside this he worked on the history and theory of the press: his books of 1973 and 1979 deal with the press of Uzbekistan and with party guidance of the mass media.

He wrote fiction as well. In the story “Sharafat the Fearless” and other documentary works he turned to real lives, and the novels “The Master and the Emir” (1985) and “The Master’s Fate” (1987), about the craftsman Shirin Murodov, became his best-known literary works.

On 19 May 2000 Ruben Safarov was elected a full member of the Academy of Sciences of Uzbekistan. He held the title of Honoured Worker of Culture (in 1980, of the Uzbek SSR) and was awarded the Shuhrat Medal. He died on 5 July 2016 in Tashkent.