EurasiaNet Eurasia Insight - Turkmen Dissidents Seek International Support to Unseat President

EURASIA INSIGHT

TURKMEN DISSIDENTS SEEK INTERNATIONAL SUPPORT TO UNSEAT PRESIDENT
7/08/02

Exiles and dissidents, terming their native Turkmenistan "one of the most repressive countries in the world," laid out steps for "overthrowing" its chief after gathering with advocates in Vienna in June. These steps, though, presume support from multinational institutions. After a meeting co-sponsored by the International Helsinki Federation and Moscow’s Memorial Human Rights Center, a "round-table" of Turkmen dissident groups laid out a plan for a new Turkmenistan � and asked agencies from other countries to effect that plan.

The blueprint produced by the June 10 meeting calls for free and fair elections, the release of specific political prisoners, and a broad expansion of rights to speak and assemble. Unlike earlier such calls, though, the list carries the imprimatur of the International Helsinki Federation, which hosted the meeting. With federation director Aaron Rhodes declaring his support for a "Helsinki Commission of Turkmenistan in exile," the document serves as a unified opposition agenda in Central Asia’s most autocratic state. But instead of trying to organize dissent within the country, the activists have applied "international" standards to declare Niyazov "illegitimate." The dissidents lay out a plan for a new state that abides by the Turkmen constitution but operates under international auspices.

The main document calls for free expression, inspection of prisons and hospitals by international rights workers, investigation into claims of torture and an end to Niyazov’s year-old fees on marriage between natives and immigrants. The dissidents want vetting of the National Security Agency (KNB, as the Turkmen abbreviate it) and reparations for people whose homes were destroyed by "state reconstruction programs." Such steps would logistically require outside help. Other steps, like a ban on child labor in farming and a return of religious and civic organizations, would require external legal and political muscle. Rather than calling for a revolution, the document proposes to end Niyazov’s lifetime presidency through international pressure. Its last recommendation proposes to make "international human rights obligations� the foundation for the conceptualization and implementation of foreign investment and credit grant-driven projects in Turkmenistan."

Other dissidents, most notably former Foreign Minister Boris Shikhmuradov, have met quietly with international entities to help subvert Niyazov’s regime. [For more information, see the Eurasia Insight archives]. The Helsinki group, whom Shikhmuradov endorsed but did not join, explicitly asked global organizations to take up their cause. "The representatives of the Turkmen democratic opposition consider it necessary for international organizations, and first of all for the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, to take certain measures for bringing the Turkmen administration to the fulfillment of international obligations in the field of human rights and freedoms," their statement said. One such measure would be to "deprive Niyazov’s regime of the membership in such organizations due to gross violations of [their] basic principles." Though Turkmenistan is officially neutral in relations with all other countries, Niyazov has sought revenues from selling natural gas and building gas pipelines. A ban from the OSCE would officially tarnish Turkmenistan’s international standing.

The Turkmen opposition, in choosing this course, is stressing its own unity. The statement receives the endorsement of Turkmen Communists, Social Democrats, veterans and expatriates in Afghanistan and Iran. "The representatives of the Turkmen opposition decided to consolidate all their forces," says the statement, but even these forces do not expect to subvert Niyazov. Instead, they hope to "overthrow" the president "in co-operation with international partners." In that spirit, the group also calls on "the international community" to document human rights abuses in Turkmenistan’s Central Asian neighbors and cooperate with human rights experts in administering reform efforts. Specifically, the group urges "international, nongovernmental human rights and humanitarian organizations to undertake a coordinated campaign to raise public awareness" about Turkmen abuses. Since campaigns are hard to coordinate in themselves, it is easy to understand why dissidents from Niyazov’s closed regime have decided they can only reclaim their country with international muscle.

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