Among the topics on the agenda for the Turkmen-Russian summit in Moscow December 23 was the plight of Russian-speakers living in Turkmenistan, Moscow News (MN) writer Arkady Dubnov reported.
The Turkmen Foreign Ministry denounced MN's claim in a December 14 article that Russians with dual Russian and Turkmen citizenship would be forced to leave Turkmenistan if they chose to keep Russian citizenship, as new Turkmen legislation barred recognition of dual status.
Yet in fact, the Ministry's subsequent statement confirmed MN's concerns that Turkmenistan is in the final stages of a campaign to force out Russian-speakers. Ashgabat claims that the 1993 agreement between Turkmenistan and Russia on dual citizenship was designed to resolve residential, property and family issues for those leaving Turkmenistan. But this interpretation isn't grounded in the text of the agreement, and Turkmenistan unilaterally withdrew from its enforcement in 2003.
According to MN's sources, Moscow was prepared to start legal consultations for citizens caught by the new policy, but Ashgabat was uninterested in cooperation. The Kremlin has not pushed the issue on behalf of its citizens for the last two decades, and accordingly, the status of the Russians in Turkmenistan rose and fall on the fate of gas-price negotiations. With gas consumption down in Europe, and facing competition from China, the Russian government isn't buying Turkmen gas, and doesn’t have leverage to lobby for its citizens.
When Geldimurat Nurmuhammedov former minister of culture, publicly denounced his country's lack of democracy last month, few doubted that there would be some kind of consequences.
Within days of his interview with Radio Liberty/Radio Free Europe, tax and financial inspectors arrived at the office of Esbap, the construction firm owned by his brother, the Chronicles of Turkmenistan (chrono-tm.org), the independent exile web site reported. The company had never had any problems with the authorities before, but suddenly, it was forced to close. Berdymurad Nurmuhamedov, a lawyer who formerly worked in the prosecutor's office, was summoned by the Ministry of National Security for further interrogation about the company.
Many Turkmen-watchers were surprised at Nurmuhamedov's outspokenness, as he had served the government faithfully for years. In 1992 under past dictator Saparmurat Niyazov, he held the title of vice premier and was a member of the presidential council. But since 1994, he has been jobless and under surveillance by security police, prohibited from traveling outside Turkmenistan.
In his earlier years, Nurmuhamedov held Communist Party posts in Dashoguz. A journalist who requested anonymity told chrono-tm.org that he recalled Nurmuhamedov as a man of principle, "sober-thinking and with a good memory." But another unnamed former subordinate of Nurmuhamedov described him as petty and nationalist, hostile to non-Turkmens. The reason for his fall from power is not known.
The Turkmen government often uses the method of targeting family members in order to harass critics. For example, a number of officials in the failed 2002 coup were arrested, along with their family members, or relatives lost their jobs or were barred from travel abroad. Usually, the secret police hope with this tactic to get the critic’s own relatives to pressure him
Screen-grab of out-take from state TV program, shown by Turkmen Dissident TV, 2011
President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, ruler of Turkmenistan, has been steadily building up his cult of personality with awards to himself; encouragement of a popular nickname for himself ("Protector"); 24/7 coverage of his activities by state TV; state publication of his books on myriad topics; and constant presiding over mass festivals and performances in his honor.
With the death of Libya's Muammar Gaddafi and now North Korea's Kim Jong-il, there is more room for Berdymukhamedov -- who wasn't making the cut in similar media lists in the past.
In the early years after he came to power in 2007 following the death of past dictator Saparmurat Niyazov (who was also on Parade's list), Berdymukhamedov made a few corrections of his predecessor's excesses -- like restoring years of education and health clinics. That was enough for the world to greet him as a reformer and kept him off the tyrants' lists with the likes of Uzbekistan's strongman for 22 years, President Islam Karimov.
Now the Turkmen reforms are seen as shallow and incomplete, and his increasing control over every aspect of life in Turkmenistan is starting to become visible.
Parade charts Berdymukhamedov's rise to power from his dental practice in Ashgabat by currying favor with Niyazov and explains how the portraits of himself everywhere, his manipulation of the constitution to get in office, and keeping more than half the population below the poverty line, despite Turkmenistan's hydrocarbons riches all helped earn Berdymukhamedov a spot on the dictators' list.
The Economist Intelligence Unit (EIU) has ranked Turkmenistan at 165 out of 167 countries of the world in its Democracy Index for 2011 (registration required), only slightly above Chad and Korea.
The EIU mentions some similarities between Central Asia and the countries of the Middle East and North America undergoing the "Arab Spring" -- rampant corruption and elites controlling the bulk of assets -- but highlights the differences between the two.
Although Central Asian nations like Turkmenistan have a "young and restless" population, their unemployment rates have been lower, and the countries' growth in GDP has been more rapid per capita than in MENA. Income disparities have been less.
Those factors "reduce the chances of CIS authoritarian regimes being subjected to similar challenges" faced by Arab leaders.
While the median income in Central Asia is much lower than in MENA, the EIU also points out that in some energy-rich countries like Turkmenistan, the regime has essentially been able to buy off unrest in the population with subsidies of utilities and food.
There's also the different role of social media when the two regions are compared:
Although Internet access is relatively high, especially in urban areas, some CIS countries (Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan in particular) are so closed that the chances of political contagion from abroad are reduced significantly.
Family in Samarkand cooks outside in 2009, as gas pressure always drops at the first cold weather.
Residents of Uzbekistan's Andijan region have been freezing as the temperature drops and authorities have cut off gas service, the independent news site uznews.net reports.
Gas pressure has plummeted so drastically that even special pumps designed to extract better flows in the winter aren't working.
Residents have told uznews.net that since Monday, not only has gas service for consumers been cut off, factories are also experiencing a shortfall. Electricity to residences has also been turned off periodically for increasingly longer times.
Local authorities are blaming the energy shut-down on "technical problems due to the fall of air temperature," says uznews.net
The thermometer is not expected to rise above freezing until this weekend, local forecasters say.
Officials in the Ferghana region warned consumers three months ago to expect problems with gas supplies, suggesting they stock up on firewood. Some loads of coal were also delivered as an alternative.
Earlier this fall, some homes and factories found their gas was shut off in Tashkent and other regions for alleged non-payment.
Uzbek leaders have enhanced their arbitrary powers in recent years by eviscerating the country’s independent bar associations. A recent report prepared by Human Rights Watch details how authorities in Tashkent have turned the justice system into a mechanism to stifle dissent.
President Islam Karimov attended the informal summit of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) as well as a meeting of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in Moscow December 19-20, although he made it absolutely clear prior to the meeting that he saw no need to reconstitute the Soviet Union.
On the eve of President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov's scheduled trip to Moscow on December 23, the Turkmen envoy to Russia is trying to make nice, after months of acrimonious exchange between the two countries.
In an interview with Viktoriya Panfilova of the daily Nezavisimaya Gazeta , Turkmen Ambassador Halinazar Agahanov defends his country against charges in the Russian media that Ashgabat doesn't really have enough gas to feed all its customers, citing the estimates of 26.2 trillion cubic meters in reserves, supplied by the British consulting firm Gaffney, Clines & Associates. The diplomat then tries to smooth troubled relations by invoking the long tradition of cooperation between Russian and Turkmenistan, despite both having large reserves of hydrocarbons. Yet, inevitably Turkmenistan's litany grievances shines through.
Agahanov points out that for a long time, Ashgabat was entirely dependent on only one gas pipeline, the Central Asia-Center (CAC) line maintained by Russia. "We recall very well the situation in the mid-1990s, when the leadership of Russia's Gazprom tried rather brutally to dictate terms for the purchase of Turkmen gas, and even shut off the line completely for two years," says Agahanov. "You'll agree that this is an abnormal situation, when the leading branch of the economy of one country is put under dependence on the bureaucratic interests of a partner in the gas business," he added.
Turkmen musicians, Library of Congress, November 2011
The US and Turkmenistan organized a series of concerts and exhibits for "Turkmenistan Culture Days" in Washington, DC, the US Embassy and State News Agency of Turkmenistan reported.
A Turkmen delegation was received at the State Department and the Library of Congress to discuss bilateral cooperation and further exchanges. A musical program included the ghidjak, a traditional stringed instrument with a bow similar to a violin’s, and the dutar, a two-stringed lute.
The Turkmen government saw the program as an opportunity to show off President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov's role in preserving culture, and the US was hoping to familiarize the American public with the art of a country most could not find on a map, although it is increasingly important to American geopolitical interests. State Department writers helped the cause by describing the art scene in Turkmenistan as “reinvigorated”.
Turkmen theater and film director Annageldi Garajayev said Turkmenistan’s policy of "arts revival" involves new facilities for theater and is “creating opportunities.” He cited "new arts festivals, two new concert and cinema series, an opera revival, a successful Turkmen chamber orchestra and two new television channels devoted to culture."
The University of Maryland organized a meeting for the visiting Turkmen "cultural workers," as the Turkmen state media dubbed them, using the old Soviet phrase, and the Meridian International Center hosted an exhibition of Turkmen art,
Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov bowing to the Koran during his presidential inauguration, February 16, 2007.
Orchestrating Turkmenistan's sole state-controlled party, government-organized social movements, and labor unions as well as loyal elders and officials, President Berdymukhamedov has nominated himself as president for elections to take place February 12, 2012.
No other candidate has appeared on the scene.
At a ceremony December 15, the Turkmen leader wheeled out the state's lone Democratic Party as well as the state-run labor, women, youth and war veterans' organizations to applaud his candidacy, the opposition website gundogar.org reported, citing the Russian news agency RIA Novosti.
Merd Ishangulyyev, a pensioner and local town elder, stepped forward to formally make the nomination, unanimously supported by all the other loyalists at the meeting. With every major state-controlled organization now behind the president, it's difficult to understand how even symbolically, other candidates might emerge. Any potential rivals would still theoretically have a chance if a local initiative group of citizens were formed under the law, then registered at the discretion of local officials, and finally allowed to meet -- with everyone at the meeting showing their passports.
In the 2007 elections that brought Berdymukhamedov to power, several docile alternative candidates were permitted to run as candidates. Their purpose seemed to be to articulate themes for the carefully-controlled state media previewing Berdymukhamedov's eventual reforms in agriculture, education, and health care.
But so far, not even those kind of puppet candidates have emerged.
