As we noted last month, a meeting at the Carnegie Council for Ethics in International Affairs on June 21 was devoted to a discussion on "Activism and Policy: Prospects for Change in Turkmenistan". The video, audio, and full transcript of the session are now available on the Carnegie Council website:
Turkmenistan is a closed, autocratic Central Asian nation with a long, porous border with Afghanistan. It has been reported that Turkmenistan has the fifth largest natural gas reserves in the world, and a horrific human rights record.
This Carnegie New Leaders discussion focuses on Turkmenistan's human rights concerns, the ethics of political and economic engagement with despotic regimes, and U.S. ambitions in Turkmenistan and Central Asia.
The speakers were Prof. Alexander Cooley, Associate Professor of International Relations at Barnard College at Columbia University and Farid Tuhbatullin, head of the Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights. The session was moderated by Masha Feiguinova, Senior Program Coordinator for Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan at the Central Eurasia Project of the Open Society Institute.
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