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Category: Turkmenistan

  • Turkmen Voters Given Two Hours To Cast Ballots In Senate Election

    Turkmenistan held its first elections to a newly created senate on March 28 with 112 candidates contesting 48 senate seats.

    There were no opposition candidates on the ballot in the Central Asian former Soviet republic, which is considered one of the most repressive countries in the world.

    With a cult of personality around the 63-year-old authoritarian ruler, President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, dissent is not tolerated in Turkmenistan and all media is under strict state control.

    Voters on March 28 had only two hours to cast ballots, between the hours of 10 a.m. and noon local time, at one of six polling stations across the country — one in the capital Ashgabat and five in other regions.

    Turkmen authorities declared within hours of the vote that turnout in the country of 5.8 million people was 98.7 percent of eligible voters.

    Foreign observers were not allowed to monitor the polling stations.

    Profiles of candidates published by the government newspaper, Netralny Turkmenistan, indicated that most of the candidates in the March 28 vote were civil servants.

    Turkmenistan’s new two-chamber parliament, known as the Milli Genes, or National Council, will be made up of 56 senators and 125 deputies.

    In addition to the 48 candidates to be declared as the winners of senate seats during the next week, Berdymukhammedov also will designate his own choices for eight other senate seats.

    With reporting by AFP

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: New Rules In Kazakhstan, Death Threats In Kyrgyzstan — The Problems Facing Central Asian Journalists

    The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) released separate reports on Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan on March 23.

    Relative to Central Asia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan have the most media-friendly environments but the CPJ reports highlight various problems. In Kazakhstan, for example, the government has been limiting the ability of journalists to do their job. Meanwhile, troll factories have been operating in Kyrgyzstan to discredit the work of some reporters, and at least one journalist says death threats are being posted on his social network accounts.

    The situation is still grim for independent media in Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan remain grim, although some outlets in Uzbekistan have been testing the limits of what can and cannot be reported.

    On this week’s Majlis Podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on the problems media outlets and journalists face in Central Asia.

    This week’s guests are: from Kazakhstan, Diana Okremova, the director of the Legal Media Center in Nur-Sultan; from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Timur Toktonaliev, the Central Asia editor for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting; from New York, Gulnoza Said, the Central Asia coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists; and Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: New Rules In Kazakhstan, Death Threats In Kyrgyzstan — The Problems Facing Central Asian Journalists

    The Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ) released separate reports on Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan on March 23.

    Relative to Central Asia, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan have the most media-friendly environments but the CPJ reports highlight various problems. In Kazakhstan, for example, the government has been limiting the ability of journalists to do their job. Meanwhile, troll factories have been operating in Kyrgyzstan to discredit the work of some reporters, and at least one journalist says death threats are being posted on his social network accounts.

    The situation is still grim for independent media in Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan remain grim, although some outlets in Uzbekistan have been testing the limits of what can and cannot be reported.

    On this week’s Majlis Podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on the problems media outlets and journalists face in Central Asia.

    This week’s guests are: from Kazakhstan, Diana Okremova, the director of the Legal Media Center in Nur-Sultan; from Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan, Timur Toktonaliev, the Central Asia editor for the Institute for War and Peace Reporting; from New York, Gulnoza Said, the Central Asia coordinator at the Committee to Protect Journalists; and Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • China Prepares New Era Of ‘Belt And Road’ Amid Pandemic Pressures

    After declaring victories over extreme poverty and the coronavirus, Chinese leader Xi Jinping has laid out a new path for China’s economic rise at home and abroad that could force Beijing to adapt to new difficulties caused by the pandemic.

    The future direction came as the Chinese Communist Party’s legislature, the National People’s Congress, convened in Beijing on March 5 for a more-than-week-long gathering to unveil a new economic blueprint — known as the country’s 14th five-year plan — and chart a broad course for China to claim its place as a modern nation and true global power.

    The annual summit of Chinese lawmakers laid out broad guidelines that would shape the country’s growth model over the next 15 years.

    Preoccupied with growing China’s tech industry amid a deepening rivalry with the United States, it also provided a platform for Xi to tout the merits of his autocratic style and tightening grip on power at home.

    While the stagecraft of the conclave focused on China’s domestic goals, they remain deeply intertwined with Beijing’s global ambitions, particularly the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI) — a blanket term for the multibillion-dollar centerpiece of Xi’s foreign policy that builds influence through infrastructure, investment, and closer political ties.

    “The message is a continuation and doubling-down of what we’ve been seeing for years, which is that China is growing stronger and it feels confident to elbow its way in even more around the world,” Raffaello Pantucci, a senior associate fellow at London’s Royal United Services Institute, told RFE/RL.

    A giant screen shows Chinese President Xi Jinping attending the closing session of the National People's Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 11.

    A giant screen shows Chinese President Xi Jinping attending the closing session of the National People’s Congress at the Great Hall of the People in Beijing on March 11.

    Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi echoed this during an expansive March 8 press conference on the sidelines of the congress in Beijing, where he said there would be no pause for BRI and that it had and would continue to evolve amid the constraints and opportunities caused by the pandemic.

    “[BRI] isn’t so much a specific project as it is a broad vision,” Pantucci said, “and visions can be reshaped as needed, which is what we’re seeing now.”

    An Evolving Vision

    Despite the display of strength and unity coming out of Beijing over the country’s success in curbing the spread of COVID-19 and keeping its economy growing amid the pressures of the pandemic, Beijing finds itself facing new global pressure.

    The BRI has suffered setbacks recently due to concerns in host countries over mounting debts, with many governments — from Africa to Central Asia — asking China for debt forgiveness and restructuring. Beijing is also looking to rebuild its credibility, which was hurt over its early handling of COVID-19 in the central city of Wuhan, and navigate growing pressure from Western countries that have begun to push back against Chinese tech and political policies.

    In the face of this, Beijing has looked for new opportunities to demonstrate global leadership, providing vaccines and medical equipment to countries across the globe and raising climate-change concerns.

    This has also applied to the BRI.

    During his press conference, Wang focused on the initiative’s traditional infrastructure emphasis, but also pointed towards new horizons for the policy, such as medical diplomacy as well as a shifting focus on tech and foreign aid. China is the world’s largest emerging donor and a new white paper released in January by the Chinese government outlined its plans to play an ambitious leading role in the international aid system.

    Many experts also say Beijing will look to build off its growing “vaccine diplomacy” campaign and use China’s recent success in fighting poverty to find new ways to build ties and deepen cooperation around the world.

    “Fighting poverty and medical coordination linked to the pandemic and its aftermath will be a major focus of Chinese diplomacy moving forward,” Zhang Xin, a research fellow at Shanghai’s East China Normal University, told RFE/RL. “[BRI] is an umbrella initiative that can include everything and this will be one of the new fronts under that umbrella.”

    Realities On The Ground

    Despite the growing opportunities, China’s flagship project is also facing plenty of challenges from the COVID-19 pandemic on the ground.

    In addition to debt concerns, closed or partially open borders with China’s neighbors in South and Central Asia due to China’s strict COVID restrictions remain a point of tension, and have led to massive lines, trade bottlenecks, and ballooning transportation costs.

    China’s overseas energy lending has likewise dropped to its lowest level since 2008, after the pandemic severely hampered deal-making in developing states, according to Boston University’s Global Energy Finance Database, which saw financing for foreign energy projects fall by 43 percent to $4.6 billion in 2020.

    And while the pandemic provided an all-time high for freight-train traffic to Europe from China, it has slowed trade from Central Asia to China. Only limited traffic is allowed to pass through China’s border post with Kyrgyzstan, something the new government in Bishkek is trying to change as it deals with the economic blows of the pandemic.

    Kyrgyz Prime Minister Ulukbek Maripov met with Du Dewen, China’s ambassador to Bishkek, on March 3 to discuss speeding up border crossings and increasing trade, but progress remains uncertain as long as China stays wary of the spread of COVID-19 in Central Asia.

    Similarly, traders in Tajikistan are still grappling with border closures as they remain cut off from their main export destination. Many of the merchants complain they are being squeezed out by Chinese competitors.

    Preliminary Chinese trade data for 2020 shows that imports to China from Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan fell by more than 45 percent compared to 2019.

    Tensions also continue to flare in Pakistan, where the $62 billion China-Pakistan Economic Corridor (CPEC), China’s flagship BRI project, is progressing slowly amid multiple setbacks and delays. While problems with the initiative are not new, Beijing has aired its frustrations and supported the Pakistani military taking greater control over CPEC, which it views as a more reliable partner than the country’s political class.

    Global Headwinds

    Trade and relations with neighboring Russia, however, appear to still be a bright spot for Beijing. Russian customs figures show that China continues to make up a growing share of its trade as Moscow increasingly finds itself sanctioned and cut off from the West.

    Political ties between Beijing and Moscow are also deepening. Wang spoke at length at his press conference about how the two governments were working closer together in a variety of fields, from plans to build a lunar space station to joint efforts in vaccine production.

    Wang also said that the two countries were working to combat “color revolutions” and to fight against a “political virus,” hinting at their shared animosity towards the United States.

    “The overall tone is quite clear, the partnership between China and Russia is being heavily valued,” Zhang said. “The Chinese state is emphasizing this relationship and how they can act together [with Russia] to face shared challenges around the world.”

    Chief among those challenges for Beijing is continuing to grow its economy at home and navigate its rivalry with the United States.

    U.S. Secretary of State Antony Blinken and national-security adviser Jake Sullivan will meet with their Chinese counterparts in Alaska on March 18 for the first meeting between Beijing and the administration of President Joe Biden.

    China is also looking to take successful policies at home and build upon them abroad under the banner of the BRI. China was the only major world economy to expand last year and many of its neighbors across Eurasia are hoping Chinese economic growth can help them with a post-pandemic recovery.

    But China’s own recovery remains fragile in some areas, including in consumer spending, and regulators are growing more worried about real-estate prices rising to unsustainable levels. The Chinese stock market began to recover on March 11 after a large rout that saw officials censor the word “stock market” from social media searches in the country, showcasing the sensitivity to anything that can derail Beijing’s ambitions at home or abroad.

    “There are many challenges ahead for the Chinese leadership to navigate and maintaining economic growth is the biggest one,” Ho-Fung Hung, a professor of political economy at Johns Hopkins University, told RFE/RL. “Xi cares about political power and boosting economic growth is the best way to hold on to political power.”

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: What Is Turkey Seeking In Central Asia?

    Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu visited three Central Asian countries from March 6 to 9.

    Boosting trade was a big part of Cavusoglu’s mission during his visit to Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan, but there were unique reasons for the Turkish minister’s visit to each country.

    On this week’s Majlis Podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on Turkish-Central Asian ties and what Cavusoglu was doing in Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Kyrgyzstan.

    This week’s guests are: from the United Kingdom, Gul Berna Ozcan, reader in international business and entrepreneurship at the Royal Holloway University of London; from Bishkek, Medet Tiulegenov, assistant professor at the American University of Central Asia; and Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Euronews on Achilova and the MEA was banned by Turkmenistan

    It now transpired that Turkmenistan on March 8 stopped broadcasting the news TV channel Euronews, which showed the footage about the 2021 Martin Ennals Award Ceremony for Human Rights Defenders and one of its finalist, the Turkmen journalist Soltan Achilova, independent foreign-based news website Chronicles of Turkmenistan reported.

    The 2021 Award Ceremony of the most prestigious award for human rights defenders was held in an online format on 11 February.

    As Vienna-based Chronicles of Turkmenistan has reported, l This year’s finalists included Soltan Achilova, a 72-year-old journalist and activist who has reported on state repression in Turkmenistan in the face of relentless intimidation. Her story was well told in a recent profile by AFP news agency. [see also; https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2021/02/23/soltan-achilova-has-issued-a-rare-rebuke-of-the-turkmen-president-on-youtube/]

    Akhal-Teke is a weekly Eurasianet column compiling news and analysis from Turkmenistan. It added on 9 March: Euronews is about as anodyne a news channel as one could hope to find. So much so that the Turkmen Foreign Ministry in January 2020 hosted the channel’s chief business development officer, Roland Nikolaou, for talks on future cooperation. That makes the inclusion of Euronews among the ranks of undesirables all the more remarkable. 

    Turkmenistan has the backup option of Mir 24, a Euronews clone based out of Moscow and focused on news from Commonwealth of Independent States members. Turkmenistan is an associate member of the post-Soviet bloc. The station began broadcasting inside the country in December 2020, following a cooperation deal signed with the Turkmen state broadcaster a month earlier. 

    Mir 24 also produces content, of the most unimaginably inoffensive kind, from inside the country. Recent reports have included one on a highly chaste beauty contest for female students, several touching upon celebrations for International Women’s Day and a piece about the creation of a national annual holiday devoted to the Alabai dog breed. 

    Blocking Euronews is of little import in the larger scheme of things. As RFE/RL wrote on March 7, police are adopting invigorated measures to make sure that smartphone owners are not using VPN services to circumvent censorship. The broadcaster said that authorities in the city of Mary are stopping people in the street for spot inspections of their phones.  

    The cause of this alarm is the continued seepage of news belying the absurd government insistence that the country has experienced no cases of COVID-19.

    https://www.timesca.com/index.php/news/23543-turkmenistan-stops-broadcasting-euronews-channel-after-tv-footage-about-turkmen-journalist

    https://eurasianet.org/turkmenistan-a-ban-on-all-news-ye-who-enter-here

    This post was originally published on Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards.

  • Turkmenistan Ramps Up Controls Over Outside Information

    Police in authoritarian Turkmenistan are reportedly further tightening controls over information as the secretive country downplays the coronavirus pandemic and clamps down on brewing discontent over years of economic turmoil.

    RFE/RL’s correspondents report that police have been searching the smartphones of medical professionals at hospitals and tracking down young people who use VPNs that allow Internet users to skirt restrictions.

    In the eastern city of Turkmenabat, police have reportedly been checking the phones of health-care workers to find out who has been speaking to RFE/RL and other media about the pandemic situation in the tightly controlled country.

    RFE/RL and other independent publications have reported that the country’s population is suffering from coronavirus, hospitals are strained, and deaths are rising.

    Meanwhile, Turkmen authorities continue to pretend there is no coronavirus in the country, which hasn’t registered any official cases.

    State media does not cover the situation either, even as the country enforces multiple health-related restrictions.

    Turkmenistan began vaccinations against coronavirus in early February using the Russian-produced Sputnik V shot. But the authorities have not officially announced the start of a vaccination campaign.

    Turkmenistan’s security services regularly check the personal information of people and use Internet blocking methods and surveillance of virtual private network (VPN) users to limit the availability of independent information.

    The authorities in the city of Mary have stepped up their search for those using VPNs by stopping people on the streets to inspect mobile phones, calling suspects in for questioning, and detaining alleged violators for up to 15 days.

    The crackdown comes as the authorities are on edge over a growing protest movement in the country and in the diaspora spurred by the oppressive political environment and deteriorating economic conditions.

    According to a joint statement issued by the Moscow-based Memorial Human Rights Center and the Turkmen Helsinki Foundation on March 4, there are also increasing reports of new pressure on citizens of Turkmenistan living abroad and active on the Internet.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Soltan Achilova has issued a rare rebuke of the Turkmen President – On YouTube

    Turkmen journalist Soltan Achilova (file photo)
    Turkmen journalist Soltan Achilova (file photo)

    On 19 February 2021 RFE/RL reported that 71-year-old Turkmen journalist Soltan Achilova has issued a rare rebuke of the Central Asian nation’s authoritarian President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, criticizing him and his government in a video posted on YouTube for failing to provide proper heating and water supply to Ashgabat residents during winter.

    In the video statement that appeared on YouTube late on February 18, Achilova, who has previously worked as a reporter for RFE/RL’s Turkmen Service, said she will no longer call Berdymukhammedov “respected” because “millions of Turkmen had stopped respecting you long ago.”

    Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov (file photo)
    Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov (file photo)

    Such an act of public dissent is a rare occurrence in Turkmenistan, where Berdymukhammedov has run the former Soviet republic with an iron fist since 2006, becoming the center of an elaborate personality cult

    Last month, Achilova was named as one of three finalists for the Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders for her reports from Turkmenistan, one of the most repressive countries in the world. SEE ALSO: Turkmen Journalist Achilova Among Finalists For Top Human Rights Prize [https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2021/01/18/%e2%80%8b%e2%80%8bmartin-ennals-award-finalists-2021-announced/]. See also: https://www.martinennalsaward.org/hrd/soltan-achilova/#film

    Achilova also criticized Berdymukhammedov and his government for what she called a “failure to provide” ordinary people with decent food at acceptable prices, adding that “miserable pensions and salaries in the country” do not provide people with the means to shop for regular items at local markets. Achilova added that the heating system in her apartment had been switched off several times in recent days, which she called an intentional warning over her journalistic activities.

    “Our fellow Turkmen citizens working in foreign countries have staged several protests recently demanding your resignation. We join those protests and demand your resignation as well because you are incapable of carrying out your duties. We are suffering and you do not even care about it. All you are capable of is ruining our homes and causing our people to suffer,” Achilova said.

    Based in Ashgabat, Achilova is currently a contributor to the Vienna-based independent news website Khronika Turkmenistana (Chronicles of Turkmenistan), which focuses on news and developments in Turkmenistan.
    Turkmen authorities, who don’t tolerate an independent press, have targeted Achilova in the past for her work as a journalist. SEE ALSO: RFE/RL Correspondent Roughed Up — Again — In Turkmenistan

    https://www.rferl.org/a/turkmenistan-journalist-achilova-rare-public-rebuke-president-berdymukhammedov/31111278.html

    https://www.timesca.com/index.php/news/23482-turkmenistan-journalist-posts-rare-public-rebuke-of-president-on-youtube

    This post was originally published on Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders and their awards.

  • Turkmen Opposition Groups Abroad Demand Investigation Into Teen Athlete’s Killing

    Turkmen opposition groups abroad have announced protests to demand authorities in Turkmenistan investigate the death of a 14-year-old judoka, who they claim was killed for refusing to throw a fight.

    The Democratic Choice of Turkmenistan movement and the Turkmen Coordination Council opposition group announced on YouTube on February 15 that they plan to hold several protests after Suleiman Tursunbaev’s death.

    On February 14, Tursunbaev’s parents issued a statement on YouTube saying their son was kidnapped by unidentified people in the town of Baherden immediately after winning a judo competition which he had been ordered to lose by the tournament’s organizers.

    The boy was later found severely beaten and unconscious, and died in hospital several days afterwards.

    According to a report by Turkmen News, Tursunbaev’s coach was also severely beaten after the end of the tournament.

    The parents appealed to President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov to find and punish their son’s killers.

    The Turkmen News opposition online newspaper reported that organizers had ordered the teenager to lose the final to an opponent from a military school, which he refused to do and instead went ahead and won the tournament.

    The opposition groups claim that the boy might have been killed by local officials in retaliation for his refusal to throw the fight.

    There was no immediate reaction from the tournament organizers to the accusations.

    The Democratic Choice of Turkmenistan and the Turkmen Coordination Council will hold an online protest via Zoom on February 16 and will stage single-person pickets on Istanbul’s Taksim Square on February 19 demanding a fair investigation into the death.

    On February 20, the groups will hold a minute of silence at noon, Ashgabat time, to honor Tursunbaev.

    Turkmen News quoted the two opposition groups’ representatives as saying that they will also hold a rally outside the UN building in New York on February 19.

    With reporting by Turkmen News

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Dynastic Succession, Renewed Hopes For Pipelines: What’s Going On In Turkmenistan?

    There has been a lot of news coming out of Turkmenistan lately — the president’s heir-apparent son climbed up a few more rungs on the government ladder, a Taliban delegation visited Ashgabat and promised not to hinder the construction of a natural-gas pipeline from Turkmenistan through Afghan territory, and a long dispute with Azerbaijan over ownership of a gas and oil field in the Caspian Sea was resolved.

    On this week’s Majlis Podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on what has been happening in Turkmenistan recently and if any of these events signal a change in the country’s future.

    This week’s guests are: from Glasgow, Luca Anceschi, professor of Central Asian Studies at Glasgow University and author of the book Turkmenistan’s Foreign Policy: Positive Neutrality And The Consolidation Of The Turkmen Regime; from Moscow, Stanislav Pritchin, an expert on the Caucasus region and Central Asia who is currently a senior research fellow at the Russian Academy of Sciences’ Center for Post-Soviet Studies IMEMO (Institute of World Economy and International Studies); from Prague, Farruh Yusupov, the director of RFE/RL’s Turkmen Service, known locally as Azatlyk; and from Prague, Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Turkmen Leader’s Son Takes On New Roles, Rapid Rise Renews Talk Of Succession

    ASHGABAT — Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov has appointed his son Serdar to the posts of deputy prime minister and chairman of the Supreme Control Chamber, renewing speculation the 63-year-old autocrat is grooming his son to be his successor.

    State media outlets reported on February 12 that according to the presidential decrees signed the day before, Serdar Berdymukhammedov also became a member of the State Security Council.

    The promotions come a year after the younger Berdymukhammedov assumed the post of minister of industry and construction. A year before that, he was promoted to the post of provincial governor.

    The rapid rise of Berdymukhammedov’s son, whose political career started in late 2016 when he became a lawmaker, appears to lay the groundwork for the 39-year-old to eventually take over the tightly controlled Central Asian state.

    Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, speaks to journalists after casting his ballot as his son Serdar (second right) stands with other family members at a polling station in Ashgabat in February 2017.

    Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, speaks to journalists after casting his ballot as his son Serdar (second right) stands with other family members at a polling station in Ashgabat in February 2017.

    Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov has run the former Soviet republic since 2006, tolerating no dissent and becoming the center of an elaborate personality cult. Turkmens often refer to him as “Arkadag” (The Protector).

    Serdar Berdymukhammedov is often referred to in state media as “the son of the nation,” and his appearances in television reports along with his father are called “the symbol of generations’ continuance.”

    In his new job, Serdar Berdymukhammedov will supervise activities related to digitalization and the introduction of innovative technologies to the state and social infrastructure, as well as the health-care, education, financial and economic sectors, his father said in a televised statement.

    Government critics and human rights groups say Berdymukhammedov has suppressed dissent and made few changes in the secretive country since he came to power after the death of autocrat Saparmurat Niyazov.

    Like his late predecessor, Berdymukhammedov has relied on subsidized prices for basic goods and utilities to help maintain his grip on power.

    According to Human Rights Watch, Berdymukhammedov, “his relatives, and their associates control all aspects of public life, and the authorities encroach on private life.”

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Analysis: What Happened When The Taliban Visited Turkmenistan?

    Neither Taliban nor Turkmen officials are giving any details about their talks after a delegation from the Muslim extremist group arrived in Turkmenistan on February 6.

    With only scant information available about the meetings in the Turkmen capital, Ashgabat, here is what is known.

    The delegation to Ashgabat was led by Mullah Abdul Ghani Baradar and, according to an unusually prompt statement the same day from the Turkmen Foreign Ministry, the Taliban came to talk about construction of the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India (TAPI) natural-gas pipeline, the Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan (TAP) power line, and further connecting Afghanistan to Turkmenistan by railway.

    Baradar also led the Taliban delegation to Iran on January 26 and to Pakistan on December 16, 2o20.

    Those visits were to discuss the stalled Afghan peace talks that began last year in the Qatari capital, Doha.

    The Turkmen Foreign Ministry statement included a brief statement from Taliban delegation member Mohammad Suhail Shahin, who said, “Without a doubt, the early start on the construction of projects such as TAPI, TAP, and a railroad from Turkmenistan to Afghanistan will contribute to the achievement of peace and economic development in Afghanistan.”

    Shahin said the Taliban would ensure the “protection of all national projects implemented in our country” that are done to benefit the Afghan people.

    He added that “we declare our full support for the realization and security of the TAPI project and other infrastructure projects in our country.”

    The Value Of A Taliban Promise

    The Taliban have made such promises before, including in November 2016 when spokesman Zabihullah Mujahid said in a statement that the Taliban “not only support all national projects that are in the interest of the people and result in the development and prosperity of the nation, but are committed to protecting them.”

    In January and February of that same year, the Taliban cut power lines in northern Afghanistan that carried electricity from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan.

    The destruction left areas in northern Afghanistan without power and greatly reduced electricity supplies to Kabul.

    After the Taliban pledge in 2016, Deputy presidential spokesman Shah Hussain Murtazawi said that in the months before making that promise, the Taliban had destroyed 302 schools, 41 health clinics, 50 mosque minarets, 5,305 houses, 1,818 shops, a government building, six bridges, 293 overpasses, and 123 kilometers of roads in 11 provinces.

    In May 2020, Afghan Interior Ministry spokesman Tariq Arian said the Taliban had destroyed 110 public projects in 14 provinces during the previous six months, including “three pylons for electricity imported from Tajikistan in the Baghlan-e Markazi district [and] two pylons for electricity coming from Uzbekistan in the Dand-e Shahabuddin and Khwaja Alwan neighborhoods of Pul-e Khumri, Baghlan Province.”

    Insecurity Scaring Investment

    As for TAPI, it has been Turkmenistan’s desire to build the pipeline for more than 25 years, but security problems in Afghanistan have always made its realization impossible.

    Journalist Ahmed Rashid is the author of the bestselling book Taliban and is one of the leading authorities on Afghanistan.

    He told RFE/RL’s Gandhara website that “In 1990s when Ashgabat pushed for building the TAPI pipeline it became impossible because the Taliban began executing women in the football stadiums.”

    Rashid added that now “It is very unlikely that there ever will be any foreign investment in Afghanistan if the Taliban are in control of the government and they do not compromise with the Kabul regime and they do not work out their modus operandi.”

    Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks during a ceremony marking the start of work on the TAPI pipeline in Herat, Afghanistan, on February 23, 2018.

    Afghan President Ashraf Ghani speaks during a ceremony marking the start of work on the TAPI pipeline in Herat, Afghanistan, on February 23, 2018.

    There is not only a question of foreign investment, but also of who exactly would be tasked with construction.

    It is presumed that foreign workers with experience building pipelines along with the necessary machinery would be brought to construction sites.

    But which companies would send their employees and equipment to areas where fighting rages or areas under Taliban control, knowing these workers could be caught up in the fighting or used as human shields?

    The Pipeline

    Turkmenistan’s need for TAPI has never been greater. The country is mired in economic problems that stem mainly from its inability to find markets for natural gas, its main export.

    Currently, the only significant exports of Turkmen gas go to China and last year Beijing significantly reduced the amount of Turkmen gas it imports via the three pipelines that connect the two countries.

    The TAPI project proposes to carry 33 billion cubic meters (bcm) of Turkmen gas more than 1,000 kilometers through western Afghanistan, then across the south through Kandahar to Pakistan, and on to Fazilka in India.

    Afghanistan would receive 5 bcm of that gas, Pakistan and India would both receive 14 bcm with Afghanistan and Pakistan also collecting transit fees.

    Turkmenistan is desperate for revenue and late last fall started making a new push to get the TAPI project moving again after Ashgabat finally agreed to cut the price it planned to charge Pakistan and India for that gas.

    Both India and Pakistan had been demanding that Turkmenistan slash its price for natural gas, with Pakistan saying it would not start construction of its section of TAPI until that dispute was resolved.

    While Turkmenistan did agree to reduce the price, talks on the exact reduction continue and, as recently as September 2020, Pakistan was saying “it would like to do the TAPI groundbreaking in Pakistan at the earliest after the finalization of the issues under discussion,” one of those issues being the price of the gas, which Pakistan insists must be significantly lower than the price of liquefied natural gas (LNG).

    But even if all parties are convinced of the security guarantees, there are still several obstacles facing the construction of TAPI.

    What Was Discussed In Ashgabat?

    One of the intriguing elements of the Taliban delegation’s visit to Ashgabat was that they were received in the capital.

    Turkmenistan is an isolated country that grants very few foreigners entry and, since the coronavirus pandemic started last year, Turkmen authorities have done their best to seal the country, especially Ashgabat.

    For nearly a year now, foreign flights have been directed through the eastern city of Turkmenabat.

    The Turkmen authorities have denied the presence of coronavirus in the country.

    The Turkmen authorities have denied the presence of coronavirus in the country.

    The only visit to Ashgabat by a foreign delegation since then — excluding German doctors who flew to Turkmenistan twice to check on the president — has been a mission from the World Health Organization in July 2020 that Turkmen authorities hoped would validate their bizarre claim that the country is completely free of the coronavirus.

    So whatever Turkmen officials wanted to discuss with the Taliban, it was important enough to bring them to Ashgabat.

    TAPI is certainly important to Turkmenistan, but as noted, the obstacles in building the pipeline through Afghanistan remain formidable and the current situation makes construction impossible.

    Electricity Instead Of Gas?

    Since April 2018, Turkmenistan has offered at least three times to host Afghan peace talks, though there is no mention of such an offer being made in reports from the February 6 meeting, which is interesting when remembering that Afghan peace talks were at the top of the agenda when the Taliban recently visited Pakistan and Iran.

    The Turkmen Foreign Ministry’s statement mentioned nothing about the peace talks beyond a vague allusion to the “importance of establishing and maintaining peace and stability in Afghanistan.”

    But perhaps one of the main topics of discussion between the Taliban delegation and the Turkmen government was not gas, but electricity.

    Turkmenistan is looking to export electricity through Afghanistan to Pakistan after the construction of a proposed 500 kilovolt TAP, a power-transmission line.

    On January 14, Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov and Afghan President Ashraf Ghani watched the inauguration via video link of the first part of TAP — the Karki-Andkhoy-Pul-e Khomri power-transmission project.

    Turkmenistan already exports electricity to areas in northern Afghanistan, some of which are under Taliban control.

    The Taliban have been charging residents in these areas for the electricity, though the fees are low. It is, however, unknown how much — if any — of that money goes to paying cash-strapped Turkmenistan.

    The Afghan government usually is responsible for paying these power bills to Turkmenistan, though it is unclear how much Kabul pays for the electricity exports used in the Taliban-controlled areas of northern Afghanistan.

    But it is clear that the Taliban uses the Turkmen electricity to further their cause in northern Afghanistan.

    In late July 2018, Turkmenistan launched its third power line to Afghanistan, a 110-kilovolt transmission line that runs to Qala-e Nau, the capital of Badghis Province.

    In April 2019, the Taliban cut that power by blowing up pylons in Badghis and preventing crews from reaching the sites to make repairs.

    Then-Badghis Governor Abdul Ghafur Malikzai said, “[The] Taliban want electricity for 21 villages [under Taliban control in Badghis’s Moqo district] and their demand has been accepted. But it is not possible in one day.”

    After the February 6 Turkmen-Taliban meeting, current Badghis Governor Hesamuddin Shams told RFE/RL’s Radio Free Afghanistan, known locally as Azadi, that he welcomes the Taliban promise not to destroy infrastructure and said they now “need to act and deliver on it.”

    But Shams said insurgent behavior in his province has not changed and power lines bringing electricity from Turkmenistan continue to be targeted by extremists.

    Shams also noted that the Taliban are not the only militant group operating in Badghis Province.

    “The Bala Murghab [district] is a major center of the armed opposition,” Shams said. “In addition to the Afghan fighters it is home to militants from Uzbekistan affiliated with the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan. There are Pakistanis too.”

    Also interesting is the Turkmen authorities’ reluctance to divulge almost any information about the meeting.

    RFE/RL’s Turkmen Service, known locally as Azatlyk, reports that state media said an “Afghan delegation” visited and was careful not to name any Turkmen officials who met with them, though there is at least one photo that clearly shows Turkmen Foreign Minister Rashid Meredov sitting at the negotiation table.

    The Afghan government did not comment specifically on the visit, but did tell Azadi that all groups in Afghanistan should protect the country’s infrastructure to avoid any further suffering by the Afghan people, while also calling on the Taliban to agree to an immediate cease-fire.

    So whatever the Taliban’s business was in Ashgabat, some or most of it seems to be something that is only between them and the Turkmen government.

    Turkmenistan has UN-recognized status as a neutral country and that has been especially useful when dealing with Afghanistan. Turkmenistan tries not to take anyone’s side in the long-running conflict in that war-ravaged country.

    But for that reason it is unlikely anyone involved in the Afghan conflict views Turkmenistan as a reliable ally when it comes to achieving stability.

    Written by Bruce Pannier based on reporting from Azadi and Ikram Karam of Radio Free Afghanistan, the Turkmen Service, and Gandhara Managing Editor Abubakar Siddique.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: Lawyers In Central Asia — Defending Clients And Themselves

    January 24 was the Day of the Endangered Lawyer and an opportunity to remember the many problems some Central Asian attorneys have to face.

    In Central Asia, defendants have a right to an attorney, but state-appointed defenders have a reputation for half-hearted work or, in some cases, even supporting the prosecution in convicting their clients.

    Being an independent lawyer willing to defend people who for some reason or another are looked upon as a nuisance or threat by the governments of the region is a hazardous occupation.

    Some of these attorneys are intimidated or threatened, some are attacked, and some are imprisoned.

    On this week’s Majlis podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on the plight of lawyers in Central Asia.

    This week’s guests are: Madina Akhmetova, the director of the Dignity public association based in the Kazakh capital, Nur-Sultan; Jasmine Cameron, who is originally from Kyrgyzstan but is now a senior staff attorney at the Human Rights Center of the American Bar Association; from California, Steve Swerdlow, a longtime Central Asia watcher, recently returned from Uzbekistan, and human rights lawyer who is currently an associate professor of human rights at the University of Southern California; and from Prague, Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: Lawyers In Central Asia — Defending Clients And Themselves

    January 24 was the Day of the Endangered Lawyer and an opportunity to remember the many problems some Central Asian attorneys have to face.

    In Central Asia, defendants have a right to an attorney, but state-appointed defenders have a reputation for half-hearted work or, in some cases, even supporting the prosecution in convicting their clients.

    Being an independent lawyer willing to defend people who for some reason or another are looked upon as a nuisance or threat by the governments of the region is a hazardous occupation.

    Some of these attorneys are intimidated or threatened, some are attacked, and some are imprisoned.

    On this week’s Majlis podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on the plight of lawyers in Central Asia.

    This week’s guests are: Madina Akhmetova, the director of the Dignity public association based in the Kazakh capital, Nur-Sultan; Jasmine Cameron, who is originally from Kyrgyzstan but is now a senior staff attorney at the Human Rights Center of the American Bar Association; from California, Steve Swerdlow, a longtime Central Asia watcher, recently returned from Uzbekistan, and human rights lawyer who is currently an associate professor of human rights at the University of Southern California; and from Prague, Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Turkmen Buy Foreign Currency On Black Market As Manat Falls Sharply

    ASHGABAT — The Turkmen national currency, the manat, has lost some 10 percent of its value on the black market as citizens scramble to buy what little foreign currency is available.

    RFE/RL correspondents reported on January 29 that the currency was trading at about 32 manats to the dollar on the black market, compared with 27-28 manats a week earlier.

    Sources close to financial institutions told RFE/RL on condition of anonymity that the situation was likely caused by a decrease in remittances sent by Turkmen migrant workers from Turkey to their families, exacerbating an already existing shortage of foreign currency.

    The central bank established an official rate of 3.5 manats per dollar in 2015 and has not changed it since, while all currency exchange in cash has been banned since January 2016.

    Officials at several local municipalities and the central bank did not respond to RFE/RL requests to comment on the situation.

    The shortage began last March when the government tightened control over foreign currency after China, the main buyer of the country’s natural gas, slashed imports and global energy prices plunged.

    At the time, the central bank ordered banks to pay salaries of employees of foreign companies, organizations, and entities operating in the country, only in the Turkmen national currency.

    Turkmenistan’s tightly controlled economy has been struggling for some time, with government revenues depleted partly due to unsuccessful energy deals and low global prices for natural gas, the Central Asian country’s main export.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: Biden And Central Asia — Three Former Ambassadors Weigh In

    On January 20, Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th president of the United States. How might the new U.S. leadership change policy toward Central Asia? What might the Central Asian states be looking for from the Biden administration? And what aspects of U.S.-Central Asian relations are likely to remain the same?

    On this week’s Majlis podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on those questions and more.

    This week’s guests are: from Bishkek, the former Kyrgyz ambassador to the United States, Kadyr Toktogulov; from Washington, the former U.S ambassador to Kyrgyzstan and later Uzbekistan, Pamela Spratlen; also from Washington, the former U.S. ambassador to Kazakhstan and later Georgia, William Courtney; and from Prague, Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: Biden And Central Asia — Three Former Ambassadors Weigh In

    On January 20, Joe Biden was inaugurated as the 46th president of the United States. How might the new U.S. leadership change policy toward Central Asia? What might the Central Asian states be looking for from the Biden administration? And what aspects of U.S.-Central Asian relations are likely to remain the same?

    On this week’s Majlis podcast, RFE/RL media-relations manager Muhammad Tahir moderates a discussion on those questions and more.

    This week’s guests are: from Bishkek, the former Kyrgyz ambassador to the United States, Kadyr Toktogulov; from Washington, the former U.S ambassador to Kyrgyzstan and later Uzbekistan, Pamela Spratlen; also from Washington, the former U.S. ambassador to Kazakhstan and later Georgia, William Courtney; and from Prague, Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Azerbaijan, Turkmenistan Finally Reach Deal On Lucrative Caspian Sea Energy Field

    BAKU — Azerbaijan and Turkmenistan have reached a preliminary agreement on the joint exploration of a once-disputed section of an undersea hydrocarbons field in the Caspian Sea believed to hold lucrative energy reserves.

    The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry said on January 21 that President Ilham Aliyev and his Turkmen counterpart, Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, supervised the online signing of a memorandum on the mutual intention to jointly explore and develop the Dostluq (Friendship) undersea field.

    The field used to be called Kapaz by Baku and Serdar by Ashgabat.

    The undersea field was discovered by Soviet explorers in 1986. Experts estimate that the Dostluk hydrocarbons field contains natural gas and at least 50 million tons of oil.

    For many years after the collapse of the Soviet Union, Baku and Ashgabat were at odds over the ownership of the undersea field.

    The settlement of the issue will help pave the way for a trans-Caspian pipeline — a multibillion-dollar plan to link Turkmenistan’s giant gas fields to Europe via Azerbaijan.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Turkmen Journalist Achilova Among Top Rights Prize Finalists

    A 71-year-old Turkmen journalist has been nominated among three finalists for a prestigious human rights award for her reports from Turkmenistan, one of the most repressive countries in the world.

    The Martin Ennals Award for Human Rights Defenders in Geneva said on January 18 that Soltan Achilova “documents the human rights abuses and social issues affecting the Turkmen people in their daily lives.”

    The jury composed of 10 activist groups, including Amnesty International, recognized Achilova’s work in a country where “freedom of speech is inexistent and independent journalists work at their own peril.”

    “Despite the repressive environment and personal hardships, she is one of the very few reporters in the country daring to sign independent articles,” the statement said.

    Based in Ashgabat, Achilova is a contributor to the Vienna-based independent news website Khronika Turkmenistana (Chronicles of Turkmenistan), which focuses on news and developments in Turkmenistan.

    She has in the past worked as a reporter for RFE/RL’s Turkmen Service.

    Turkmen authorities, who don’t tolerate an independent press, have targeted the journalist for her work.

    Achilova has been detained by police and physically assaulted by officers, thugs, and other unidentified assailants, while her relatives had also come under pressure by the authorities.

    The two other nominees for the Martin Ennals Award are leading Saudi advocate for women’s rights Loujain Al-Hathloul and Chinese lawyer and human rights activist Yu Wensheng. Both of them are currently in jail.

    The statement said that the award ceremony “will celebrate their courage” during an online event co-hosted by the city of Geneva on February 11.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • ​​Martin Ennals Award Finalists 2021 announced

    Today 18 January 2021, the Martin Ennals Foundation announced that three outstanding human rights defenders based in authoritarian states are nominated for the 2021 Martin Ennals Award.

    In isolated Turkmenistan, Soltan Achilova documents human rights violations and abuses through photojournalism.

    Imprisoned in Saudi Arabia, Loujain AlHathloul is a leading advocate for gender equality and women’s rights.

    A lawyer, Yu Wensheng defended human rights cases and activists before his conviction and imprisonment in China.

    The Finalists distinguish themselves by their bravery and deep commitment to the issues they defend, despite the many attempts to silence them by respective governmental authorities. The 2021 Martin Ennals Award Ceremony will celebrate their courage on 11 February during an online ceremony hosted jointly with the City of Geneva which, as part of its commitment to human rights, has for many years supported the Award. “Every year thousands of human rights defenders are persecuted, harassed, imprisoned, even killed. The Martin Ennals Foundation is honored to celebrate the 2021 Finalists, who have done so much for others and whose stories of adversity are emblematic of the precarity faced by the human rights movement today”, says Isabel de Sola, Director of the Martin Ennals Foundation.

    For more on this and similar awards, see: https://www.trueheroesfilms.org/thedigest/award/043F9D13-640A-412C-90E8-99952CA56DCE

    “Authoritarian states tend to believe that by jailing or censoring human rights defenders, the world will forget about them. During the COVID-pandemic, it seemed like lockdowns would successfully keep people from speaking out. This year’s Finalists are a testament to the fact that nothing could be further from the truth”, says Hans Thoolen, Chair of the Jury.

    • In Turkmenistan, one of the world’s most isolated countries, freedom of speech is inexistent and independent journalists work at their own peril. Soltan Achilova (71), a photojournalist, documents the human rights abuses and social issues affecting Turkmen people in their daily lives. Despite the repressive environment and personal hardships, she is one of the very few reporters in the country daring to sign independent articles.
    • In Saudi Arabia, women still face several forms of gender discrimination, so much so, that the Kingdom ranks in the bottom 10 places according to the World Economic Forum’s Global Gender Gap Report 2020. Loujain AlHathloul (31) was one of the leading figures of the Women to drive movement and advocated for the end of the male guardianship system. She was imprisoned in 2018 on charges related to national security together with several other women activists. Tortured, denied medical care, and subjected to solitary confinement, Loujain was sentenced to 5 years and 8 months in prison on 28 December 2020. [see: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/tag/loujain-al-hathloul/]
    • In China, more than 300 human rights activists and lawyers disappeared or were arrested in 2015 during the so called 709 Crackdown. A successful business lawyer, Yu Wensheng (54) gave up his career to defend one of these detained lawyers, before being arrested himself. Detained for almost three years now, Yu Wensheng’s right hand was crushed in jail and his health is failing. [see also: https://humanrightsdefenders.blog/2019/06/26/lawyers-key-to-the-rule-of-law-even-china-agrees-but-only-lip-service/]

    Online Award Ceremony on 11 February 2021

    The 2021 Martin Ennals Award will be given to the three Finalists on 11 February 2021 at an online ceremony co-hosted by the City of Geneva (Switzerland), a long-standing supporter of the Award. “The City of Geneva reaffirms its support to human rights, especially during these times of crisis and upheaval. Human rights are the foundation of our society, not even the pandemic will stop us from celebrating brave persons who have sacrificed so much”, says Member of the executive Alfonso Gomez.

    For more information:

    Chloé Bitton
    Communications Manager
    Martin Ennals Foundation
    cbitton@martinennalsaward.org
    media@martinennalsaward.org
    Office: +41.22.809.49.25
    Mobile: +41.78.734.68.79

    Media focal point for Loujain AlHathloul
    Uma Mishra-Newberry
    FreeLoujain@gmail.com  
    https://www.loujainalhathloul.org
    +41.78.335.25.40 (on signal)

    Press release

    Press release (English)

    Press release (French)

    Press release (Chinese)

    Press release (Russian)

    Press release (Arabic)

    This post was originally published on Hans Thoolen on Human Rights Defenders.

  • Three Turkmen Border Guards Killed In Helicopter Crash

    Three Turkmen border guards were killed when their military helicopter crashed into a high-voltage power transmission tower near the border with Iran, eyewitnesses said.

    The crash took place late January 14 near the village of Yashlyk, located some 60 kilometers from the capital, Ashgabat.

    A border guard officer, who spoke to RFE/RL on condition of anonymity, said all three on board the helicopter were killed, including a captain.

    Eyewitnesses told RFE/RL that they believed that the military helicopter crashed due to dense fog and poor visibility.

    Turkmen authorities have not commented on the crash.

    Officials in the tightly controlled Central Asian nation rarely announce the deaths of military personnel.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Licorice Root As Potion To Tackle ‘Lung Disease’ In ‘Coronavirus-Free’ Turkmenistan

    TURKMENABAT, Turkmenistan — Authorities in Turkmenistan’s eastern region of Lebap have instructed employees of state organizations, schools, medical institutions, and schoolchildren to carry personal medicine boxes with them containing, among other items, bottles of licorice-root syrup to tackle possible “lung disease.”

    The instruction is obligatory and noncompliance will be punished by hefty fines as the authorities continue to deny the presence of coronavirus within the Central Asian state’s borders.

    The personal medicine boxes must also contain five medical masks, a pair of rubber gloves, sanitizer, and oxalinic ointment, RFE/RL correspondents report from the region.

    The move comes two weeks after Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov at a televised government session talked about “the great abilities” of licorice root to prevent possible coronavirus infection.

    In March 2020, Berdymukhammedov praised the smoke of burned harmel and saksaul tree, as well as consumption of noodles with pepper to prevent coronavirus infection.

    At the time, schools were instructed to use Berdymukhammedov’s book, Medicinal Plants Of Turkmenistan, in lessons across the country.

    Turkmenistan remains the only Central Asian country that has not officially reported a single coronavirus infection to the World Health Organization (WHO).

    In August, the WHO expressed concern over an increase in atypical pneumonia cases in Turkmenistan and unsuccessfully urged Ashgabat to allow it to organize independent coronavirus tests in the country.

    Turkmen officials have clung to their zero-infections statistics despite signs of outbreaks in prisons, schools, and the general population as hospitals get increasingly crowded, as well as large numbers of cases in neighboring countries.

    Many Turkmen citizens report staying home despite being ill, fearing that a trip to the doctor could infect them, as hospitals quietly strain under high numbers of patients reporting COVID-19-like symptoms.

    The bodies of victims of lung ailments are being delivered to relatives in special plastic bags, and there have been an unusually high number of fresh graves across the country, RFE/RL correspondents have reported.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • HRW Urges Biden To Champion Human Rights After Trump’s ‘Disastrous’ Tenure

    Human Rights Watch (HRW) is calling on President-elect Joe Biden to reinforce the commitment of the United States to human rights after four years of shirking it during Donald Trump’s presidency, and to join broad coalitions that have emerged to stand up to “powerful actors” such as Russia and China that have been undermining the global human rights system.

    Trump was “a disaster for human rights” both at home and abroad, HRW Executive Director Kenneth Roth wrote in an introduction to the New York-based watchdog’s annual report on human rights published on January 13.

    [Trump] cozied up to one friendly autocrat after another at the expense of their abused populations…”

    According to Roth, the outgoing president “flouted legal obligations that allow people fearing for their lives to seek refuge, ripped migrant children from their parents, empowered white supremacists, acted to undermine the democratic process, and fomented hatred against racial and religious minorities,” among other things.

    Trump also “cozied up to one friendly autocrat after another at the expense of their abused populations, promoted the sale of weapons to governments implicated in war crimes, and attacked or withdrew from key international initiatives to defend human rights, promote international justice, advance public health, and forestall climate change.”

    This “destructive” combination eroded the credibility of the U.S. government when it spoke out against abuses in other countries, Roth said, adding: “Condemnations of Venezuela, Cuba, or Iran rang hollow when parallel praise was bestowed on Russia, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, or Israel.”

    But as the Trump administration “largely abandoned” the protection of human rights abroad and “powerful actors such as China, Russia, and Egypt sought to undermine the global human rights system,” other governments stepped forward to its defense, he said.

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    After Biden’s inauguration on January 20, the U.S. government should “seek to join, not supplant” these collective efforts by a range of Western countries, Latin American democracies, and a growing number of Muslim-majority states.

    Biden should also “seek to reframe the U.S. public’s appreciation of human rights so the U.S. commitment becomes entrenched in a way that is not so easily reversed by his successors.”

    China

    According to HRW’s annual World Report 2021, which summarizes last year’s human rights situation in nearly 100 countries and territories worldwide, the Chinese government’s authoritarianism “was on full display” in 2020.

    Repression deepened across the country, with the government imposing a “draconian” national-security law in Hong Kong and arbitrarily detaining Muslims in the northwestern Xinjiang region on the basis of their identity, while others are subjected to “forced labor, mass surveillance, and political indoctrination.”

    Russia

    In Russia, HRW said the authorities used the coronavirus pandemic as a “pretext…to restrict human rights in many areas, and to introduce new restrictions, especially over privacy rights.”

    Following a “controversial” referendum on constitutional changes, a crackdown was launched on dissenting voices, with “new, politically motivated prosecutions and raids on the homes and offices of political and civic activists and organizations.”

    Belarus

    The situation wasn’t much better in neighboring Belarus, where HRW said thousands were arbitrarily detained and hundreds were subjected to torture and other ill-treatment as strongman Alyaksandr Lukashenka faced an unprecedented wave of protests following a contested presidential election in August.

    “In many cases they detained, beat, fined, or deported journalists who covered the protests and stripped them of their accreditation,” HRW said. “They temporarily blocked dozens of websites and, during several days, severely restricted access to the Internet.”

    Ukraine

    According to the watchdog, the armed conflict in eastern Ukraine “continued to take a high toll on civilians, from threatening their physical safety to limiting access to food, medicines, adequate housing, and schools.”

    Travel restrictions imposed by Russia-backed separatists and Ukrainian authorities in response to the coronavirus pandemic exacerbated hardship for civilians and drove them “deeper into poverty.”

    Balkans

    In the Balkan region, HRW said serious human rights concerns remained in Bosnia-Herzegovina over “ethnic divisions, discrimination, and the rights of minorities and asylum seekers,” while “pressure” on media professionals continued.

    There was “limited” improvement in protections of human rights in Serbia, where journalists “faced threats, violence, and intimidation, and those responsible are rarely held to account.”

    On Kosovo, HRW cited continued tensions between ethnic Albanians and Serbs and “threats and intimidation” against journalists, while prosecutions of crimes against journalists have been “slow.”

    Hungary

    Elsewhere in Europe, the government in EU member Hungary continued “its attacks on rule of law and democratic institutions” and “interfered with independent media and academia, launched an assault on members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) community, and undermined women’s rights.”

    Iran

    HRW said Iranian authorities continued to crack down on dissent, including “through excessive and lethal force against protesters and reported abuse and torture in detention,” while U.S. sanctions “impacted Iranians’ access to essential medicines and harmed their right to health.”

    Pakistan

    In neighboring Pakistan, the government “harassed and at times prosecuted human rights defenders, lawyers, and journalists for criticizing government officials and policies,” while also cracking down on members and supporters of opposition political parties.

    Meanwhile, attacks by Islamist militants targeting law enforcement officials and religious minorities killed dozens of people.

    Afghanistan

    HRW noted that fighting between Afghan government forces, the Taliban, and other armed groups caused nearly 6,000 civilian casualties in the first nine months of the year.

    The Afghan government “failed to prosecute senior officials responsible for sexual assault, torture, and killing civilians,” while “threats to journalists by both the Taliban and government officials continued.”

    South Caucasus

    In the South Caucasus, six weeks of fighting over the breakaway Nagorno-Karabakh region dominated events in both Azerbaijan and Armenia.

    HRW said all parties to the conflict committed violations of international humanitarian law, including by using banned cluster munitions.

    Central Asia

    In Central Asia, critics of the Kazakh government faced “harassment and prosecution, and free speech was suppressed.”

    Kyrgyz authorities “misused” lockdown measures imposed in response to the coronavirus epidemic to “obstruct the work of journalists and lawyers,” and parliament “advanced several problematic draft laws including an overly broad law penalizing manipulation of information.”

    Tajik authorities “continued to jail government critics, including opposition activists and journalists, for lengthy prison terms on politically motivated grounds.”

    The government also “severely” restricted freedom of expression, association, assembly, and religion, including through heavy censorship of the Internet.

    Uzbekistan’s political system remained “largely authoritarian” with thousands of people — mainly peaceful religious believers — being kept behind bars on false charges.

    Citing reports of torture and ill-treatment in prisons, HRW said journalists and activists were persecuted, independent rights groups were denied registration, and forced labor was not eliminated.

    Turkmenistan experienced “cascading social and economic crises as the government recklessly denied and mismanaged” the COVID-19 epidemic in the country, leading to “severe shortages” of affordable food.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Prominent Composer Dies Of COVID In ‘Coronavirus-Free’ Turkmenistan

    Prominent Turkmen composer Rejep Rejepov has died of COVID-19 in the Central Asian nation, where authorities continue to deny the presence of the coronavirus within the country’s borders.

    Rejepov’s brother Rahmet Rejepov wrote on Facebook on January 10 that the composer died of COVID-19 at the age of 76.

    Rejep Rejepov’s musical compositions were used in dozens of movies and documentaries shot in the Soviet era and after Turkmenistan gained independence following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

    Turkmenistan remains the only Central Asian nation that has not reported officially a single coronavirus infection to the World Health Organization (WHO).

    In August 2020, the WHO expressed concern over an increase in atypical pneumonia cases in Turkmenistan and unsuccessfully urged Ashgabat to allow it to organize independent coronavirus tests in the country.

    Turkmen officials have clung to their zero-infections statistics despite signs of outbreaks in prisons, schools, and the general population as hospitals get increasingly crowded — as well as large numbers of cases in neighboring countries.

    Many Turkmen citizens report staying home despite illness, fearing that a trip to the doctor could infect them as hospitals quietly strain under high numbers of patients reporting COVID-19-like symptoms.

    The bodies of victims of lung ailments are being delivered to relatives in special plastic bags, and there have been an unusually high number of fresh graves across the country, RFE/RL’s correspondents have reported.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Majlis Podcast: How Central Asia Dealt With COVID In 2020 And What’s Coming In 2021

    The year 2020 will always be remembered as the year the coronavirus appeared and spread across the globe.

    The virus exposed weaknesses in every country, particularly in health-care systems, but it also affected trade and tested alliances.

    The responses from the five Central Asian countries differed.

    This was most evident in their official reporting on registered cases and deaths, where countries such as Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, even though their figures were often questionable, released statistics that showed the countries were facing a serious health crisis, while countries like Tajikistan and Uzbekistan carefully manipulated figures to ensure an outward appearance of controlling the situation. And then there was Turkmenistan, which chose complete denial and continues its farcical claims that the country has somehow been immune to the coronavirus.

    How did the five countries fare in 2020 and, with various vaccines being developed and gradually being made available internationally, how does 2021 look for Central Asia?

    On this week’s Majlis Podcast, RFE/RL’s media-relations manager for South and Central Asia, Muhammad Tahir, moderates a discussion that looks at these questions.

    This week’s guests are: from Kazakhstan, Gaukhar Mergenova, a public-health specialist; from Kyrgyzstan, Ermek Ismailov, a surgeon at the Clinical Hospital Office of the President and Government of the Kyrgyz Republic; and originally from Uzbekistan but currently a senior journalist for RFE/RL’s Uzbek Service, known locally as Ozodlik, and based in Prague, Barno Anvar; and Bruce Pannier, the author of the Qishloq Ovozi blog.

    Listen to the podcast above or subscribe to the Majlis on iTunes or on Google Podcasts.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Grim Choice: Turkmen Warned Of Food Cutoffs Over Unpaid Utility Bills

    TURKMENABAT, Turkmenistan — As daily temperatures creep below freezing with the onset of winter, authorities in eastern Turkmenistan have warned families that they risk losing access to subsidized food if they don’t catch up on their utilities payments.

    The verbal warnings were issued to households in Lebap province in early December as the government launched a campaign to help state-run utilities collect unpaid bills, according to dozens of local residents who spoke to RFE/RL’s Turkmen Service.

    “Authorities have given people in our region until the end of December to pay any debts they have in utility bills,” said a resident of Darganata district. “But people can barely afford to buy bread, let alone to pay for gas and electricity.”

    Authorities in the Lebap region of Turkmenistan have given some residents until the end of December to pay any debts they have in utility bills.

    Authorities in the Lebap region of Turkmenistan have given some residents until the end of December to pay any debts they have in utility bills.

    The man and others who spoke to RFE/RL requested anonymity, saying that authorities punish those who speak to independent media.

    The outstanding debts are new to many Turkmen residents, as the former Soviet republic only ended government subsidies for gas, electricity, and drinking water a year ago.

    They also threaten to compound the effects of food shortages and economic malaise amid a coronavirus pandemic that Turkmen officials, almost uniquely in the world, still insist hasn’t caused any local infections.

    Villagers complain that, while they understand the need to pay for the energy they consume, many families spend almost all of their income on food and simply don’t have the resources to settle their debts.

    Income Struggles

    Many rural residents struggle to earn income outside of seasonal farming work, making it harder to catch up with bills in the off-season.

    Some rely on odd jobs they find in nearby cities or the remittances from family members working abroad in places like Turkey.

    But travel to cities, especially the capital, Ashgabat, has been restricted to combat the COVID-19 threat that is officially raging everywhere except Turkmenistan. (World Health Organization and other international officials have unsuccessfully urged Turkmen officials to be more forthcoming with coronavirus statistics.)

    Remittances have dried up, too, as nearby economies are hard-hit and supply chains interrupted by the ongoing pandemic.

    RFE/RL correspondents in Lebap’s Darganata and Farap districts were aware of at least 10 families who said they were unable to raise the money before the end-of-December deadline.

    Turkmen saw electricity and gas meters first installed in their homes in 2018, when the government announced it was going to end decades of major subsidies for electricity, gas, and drinking water as of the following year.

    Under a subsidies system introduced in 1993, every registered household member was entitled to 35 kilowatt-hours of electricity and 50 cubic meters of natural gas each month. The subsidies also included 250 liters of potable water per day per person.

    Turkmenistan’s economic woes caught up with it in 2014, after declining global fuel prices took a toll on the gas-rich Central Asian state’s budget.

    Many of its 6 million people have faced food price hikes and a shortage of foodstuffs for much of the past four years, although the authoritarian government in Ashgabat doesn’t acknowledge the existence of such hardship.

    The situation deteriorated further in 2020 after borders were closed and food imports were disrupted due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

    The retail price of flour has gone up by 50 percent and cooking oil by 130 percent in the past year.

    It is unclear whether authorities plan to act on their verbal warnings to deny access to subsidized food for those who don’t meet the deadline to settle their utility debts.

    Doing so could leave thousands of residents in the rural communities that were targeted facing acute hunger in the middle of winter.

    Loading up on supplies outside a state grocery store in Ashgabat. (file photo)

    Loading up on supplies outside a state grocery store in Ashgabat. (file photo)

    Many Turkmen buy staples including flour, bread, cooking oil, rice, sugar, and potatoes from state grocery shops where prices are sometimes one-sixth of what they are in private stores and bazaars.

    But the choice of goods in state-owned shops has become increasingly sparse, and supplies arrive in limited amounts.

    People often wait hours in long lines outside state stores that operate on a first come, first served basis. Many people go home empty-handed as limited supplies run out before their turn.

    In November, Ashgabat residents told RFE/RL that people in some neighborhoods were standing in line overnight to be at the front of the line when state-run shops opened at 7:00 the following morning.

    Food shortages have even sparked small public protests in Turkmenistan, where the government shows little tolerance for dissent and brutally clamps down on critics and opponents.

    On November 10, dozens of people gathered near the Garagum district government building in Mary Province to complain of a shortage of flour in local state shops.

    However, after a brief meeting with the crowd, district officials ordered the police to disperse the gathering. The authorities made no promise that they would try to resolve the problem.

    It was the second such protest in Mary Province this year. About 30 women briefly blocked a highway on April 3 before gathering in front of the Mary region’s government headquarters to protest food shortages.

    That rally ended when authorities promised the protesters two kilograms of flour each.

    Authorities haven’t publicly announced any plans for tackling the long-running food crisis in Turkmenistan, which has never held an election deemed fair and competitive by Western observers.

    Written by Farangis Najibullah with reporting by RFE/RL Turkmen Service correspondents in Lebap Province, Turkmenistan

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Media Watchdog Calls For Release Of Turkmen Reportedly Jailed For Online Photo Post

    Reporters Without Borders (RSF) on December 18 urged the OSCE’s new representative on freedom of the media to press for the release of a journalist jailed in Turkmenistan for posting a photo on a news website.

    Nurgeldy Halikov’s conviction “exemplifies the absurdity of the trumped-up charges used by the authorities to gag the free press’s few remaining representatives. He risks being tortured in prison,” Jeanne Cavelier, the head of RSF’s Eastern Europe and Central Asia desk, said in a statement on December 18.

    Turkmen.news, a website based in the Netherlands for which Halikov works, reported earlier this week that its editors had learned that the journalist was found guilty of fraud and handed the prison sentence in mid-September.

    The 26-year-old Halikov has been in custody since July 13, a day after he reposted a photo of a visiting World Health Organization delegation on Turkmen.news, which specializes in covering human rights in Turkmenistan.

    The delegation was in Turkmenistan to evaluate the possible spread of COVID-19 in the country, where officials have insisted that there are no coronavirus cases.

    Turkmenistan is led by authoritarian President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, who heads one of the world’s most oppressive governments.

    Halikov’s family had been reluctant to talk about the case amid hopes — ultimately dashed — that he would be amnestied on International Day of Neutrality, which is celebrated on December 12.

    “Turkmenistan is a black hole for news and information. The media are completely controlled by the state and few journalists take the risk of doing independent reporting,” according to Cavelier.

    “We urge the authorities to free him at once and we ask Teresa Ribeiro, the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe’s representative on freedom of the media, to firmly condemn his arbitrary detention,” he said.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • In ‘COVID-Free’ Turkmenistan, Britain’s (Singing) Ambassador Now Has COVID

    Britain’s ambassador to Turkmenistan, where an authoritarian post-Soviet government has never officially registered a single coronavirus infection, has said he “need[s] to recuperate from covid.”

    British Ambassador to Turkmenistan Hugh Philpott tweeted the news of his apparent infection on December 16 while talking about a quirky YouTube video in which he performs a song in Turkmen in front of a green-screen backdrop of that Central Asian country’s natural beauty.

    On YouTube, Philpott describes himself as “an amateur singer and diplomat” and says the “Orient TM news agency in Ashgabat invited me to record this song.” He says the agency created the video backdrop to his performance of the song Turkmen Steppe.

    He thanks those who shared the video and suggests it was “from my recuperation.”

    Later, he tweeted in reply to a former British ambassador, Robin Ord-Smith, “I need to recuperate from covid.”

    It is not clear where or when Philpott, who has served as the U.K.’s ambassador to Ashgabat since 2018, was exposed to the coronavirus.

    He did not initially respond to a tweet by an RFE/RL journalist asking him for details.

    Turkmenistan is one of 15 states or territories — nearly all of them remote Pacific islands — that have not reported a single coronavirus infection to the World Health Organization (WHO).

    In August, the WHO expressed concern over an increase in atypical pneumonia cases in Turkmenistan and unsuccessfully urged Ashgabat to allow it to organize independent coronavirus tests in the country.

    Turkmen officials have clung to their zero-infections statistics despite signs of outbreaks in prisons, schools, and the general population as hospitals get increasingly crowded, as well as large numbers of cases in neighboring countries.

    Many Turkmen citizens report staying home despite illness, fearing that a trip to the doctor could infect them as hospitals quietly strain under high numbers of patients reporting COVID-19-like symptoms.

    The bodies of victims of lung ailments are being delivered to relatives in special plastic bags, and there have been an unusually high number of fresh graves across the country.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • Independent Media Outlet Says Turkmen Man Imprisoned For Sharing Photo Online

    An independent Turkmen news website says a resident of Ashgabat has been sentenced to four years in prison because he shared a photo of the World Health Organization (WHO) delegation taken by his friend in the Central Asian nation’s capital in July.

    The website Turkmen.news reported late on December 14 that its editors had learned that 26-year-old Nurgeldy Halikov was found guilty of fraud and handed the prison sentence in mid-September.

    One of Halikov’s friends placed the picture of the WHO delegation — taken when its members were sitting outside an Ashgabat hotel — on Instagram on July 12, according to the news website.

    The delegation was in Turkmenistan, led by authoritarian President Gurbanguly Berdymukhammedov, who heads one of the world’s most-oppressive governments, to evaluate the possible spread of COVID-19 in the country, where officials have insisted that there are no coronavirus cases.

    According to the website, Halikov, who shared the picture with Turkmen.news immediately after it was taken, was summoned to police a day later.

    Law enforcement officials told Halikov’s relatives that he will be released from custody in 10 or 15 days, which never happened.

    Turkmen.news says that on July 26 its editors received an electronic message from Halikov, who wrote that his detention was linked to a situation related to $5,000 he “borrowed from an acquaintance.”

    Later, the editors said they learned that because of that “debt,” Halikov was found guilty of fraud and sentenced to four years in prison.

    The Bagtyyarlyq district court of Ashgabat told Turkmen.news that Halikov was convicted and sentenced on September 15.

    Turkmen.news stated on December 14 that the charges against Halikov were bogus and the case against him had been launched solely for sharing a photo with an independent media outlet.

    Government critics and human rights groups say Berdymukhammedov has suppressed dissent and made few changes in the restrictive country since he came to power after the death of autocrat Saparmurat Niyazov in 2006.

    Turkmen.news noted that the prosecution of people in Turkmenistan on trumped-up criminal charges is widespread, noting the case of lawyer Pygambergeldy Allaberdyev as an example.

    Allaberdyev, a lawyer with a government energy company in the western city of Balkanabat, was sentenced to six years in prison in October on charges of hooliganism and intentional infliction of moderate bodily harm.

    Human rights watchdogs say Allaberdyev was imprisoned “on bogus charges that appear to be in retaliation for his alleged ties to [Turkmen] activists abroad.”

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.

  • CIS Foreign Ministers Approve Draft On Closer Military, COVID-19 Cooperation

    Foreign Ministers of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) have approved a draft concept on further developing cooperation in several areas, including the coronavirus pandemic.

    The Kazakh Foreign Ministry said in a statement that ministers approved a number of documents at the December 10 meeting, including a concept of military cooperation between CIS member states to 2025.

    It added that the Council of the CIS leaders will be held online on December 18.

    “The participants discussed a wide range of integration cooperation issues within the CIS, with a special emphasis on joint actions to overcome the negative effects of the coronavirus pandemic,” the Russian Foreign Ministry said after the meeting.

    CIS members are former Soviet republics — Azerbaijan, Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan. Turkmenistan has an associate status in the grouping.

    Ukraine quit the grouping in 2018, four years after Russia forcibly annexed Ukraine’s Crimea region in March 2014 and started backing separatists in Ukraine’s east in a conflict that has killed more than 13,200 people since April 2014.

    Ukraine was an associate member of the CIS since the grouping was established following the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991.

    Earlier, in 2009, another former Soviet republic, Georgia, quit the CIS following a five-day Russian-Georgian war in August 2008, after which Russia has maintained troops in Georgia’s breakaway regions of South Ossetia and Abkhazia and recognized their independence from Tbilisi.

    This post was originally published on Radio Free.