Skip Nav | Home | Mobile | Editorial Guidelines | Mission Statement | About Us | Contact | Help | Security | Support Us

World

TURKMENISTAN: URGENT UPDATE

AWWA | 22.06.2006 17:02 | Analysis | Repression | World

A new wave off arrests in Turkmenistan sparks fear of a further crackdown on civil society under one of the world's most oppressive regimes.

Corporate Watch's correspondent, Alice Wilson, had spoken to some of the arrested in the preparation of her recent article (ref). Now they are under arrest, and no information is being released as to their condition.

For more information contact Alice Wislon on  alicewilson2006@yahoo.co.uk

She writes:

Between the 16th and 19th of June, seven human rights workers in Turkmenistan were arrested. They are all connected with the Turkmenistan Helsinki Foundation, which has defied the regime by its work to expose local human rights violations. It is thought they are being held at the Ministry of Internal Affairs, Ashgabat, and there is international concern that they are being tortured.

One member, Annakurban Amanklychev, had explosives and guns planted on him before he was arrested. He has since been accused of being a traitor in foreign pay, and working to foment civil unrest in the country. Amanklychev had been under surveillance for a year before his arrest.

One former member of the human rights group, now working as a journalist with Radio Liberty, was detained at her flat on the 18th of June at 5pm, by two Ashgabat city policemen. No warrant for her arrest was produced. Her family was told they were taking her 'for a conversation'. It is reported that during a phone conversation 'She seemed to have difficulty speaking. What she said was totally incoherent. We think they gave her psychotropic drugs.' That night, after midnight, a secret service officer ordered her daughters Sana and Mural to bring them their mother's computer and fax machine, they refused and were detained the following day, along with their brother.
Elena Ovezova was detained on the 18th of June, again without a warrant. No information has been released to her family. Nor is there any information about Sapardy Khadziev, who was arrested on the 18th of June, in the evening.

Turkmen National Security Minister Geldy Ashirmukhamedov, speaking on television, accused these human rights workers, a French diplomat and an official from the Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe of involvement in illegal activities. He said that these Turkmen citizens formed the nerve centre of the network which sought to foment unrest in the authoritarian Central Asian state. The country's ruthless dictator, 'Turkmenbashi', asked this official live on television: 'So did you catch everyone?' 'Yes, everyone,' his loyal minister replied. The President continued: 'The Foreign Ministry must summon all the diplomats who were involved in this case. Ask them to their faces to apologise. If they don't, they must be deported.'
Human rights defenders, political dissidents, members of religious minority groups and their families have routinely been subjected to harassment, arbitrary detention, torture or other ill-treatment and imprisonment after unfair trials. Many have been forced into exile in recent years, while thousands are believed to be on a 'blacklist' preventing them from leaving the country. As Turkmenbashi accuses his socially conscious citizens of being traitors, the question arises: who is the real traitor here? A Global Witness report recently exposed the regime's embezzlement of the revenue generated from gas sales. Three quarters of the revenue is spent 'off budget' as the civilian infrastructure has collapsed with public sector wages left unpaid, and pensions dramatically cut.

Healthcare is virtually nonexistent and the life expectancy is on a par with some of the poorest war torn countries in Africa. Female life expectancy is the lowest in the region. Yet in spite of this, as the Global Witness report highlights, the EU is becoming increasingly dependent on Turkmen gas, and on the 21st of March the European parliament's foreign-affairs committee approved a proposal for an interim trade agreement with Turkmenistan, in spite of the well known widespread use of forced labour including child labour, in the Turkmen textile industry. Turkmenbashi's domestic brutality seems to be rewarded with international trade deals. For the people in Turkmenistan, who risk their lives to raise awareness of the conditions there, this too surely is a kind of treachery.

For more information:
 http://www.corporatewatch.org/?lid=2517
 http://www.globalwitness.org/reports/show.php/en.00088.html
 http://www.eurasianet.org/resource/turkmenistan/index.shtml
 http://www.opendemocracy.net/globalization-institutions_government/turkmenistan_3522.jsp
 http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/programmes/crossing_continents/4440148.stm
 http://www.iwpr.net/?p=trk&s=p&o=-&apc_state=henprca



AWWA

Comments

Hide the following comment

Turkmenistan in gas talks with European Parliament delegation

22.06.2006 17:15

Turkmenistan in gas talks with European Parliament delegation
Turkmen Foreign Ministry press release 20 June

The European Parliament delegation, led by MP Albert Jan Maat [Vice-Chairman for relations with Turkmenistan] had a meeting at the Ministry of Oil and Gas Industry and Mineral Resources of Turkmenistan today, on 20 June 2006, as part of its visit to Turkmenistan.
In the course of a constructive dialogue, Turkmenistan's cooperation with various states in the oil and gas spheres and the development of its fuel and energy complex were discussed.

In particular, the European parliamentarians expressed their interest in the purchase of the Turkmen gas under the contract signed with Gazprom.
The m inister of oil and gas industry and mineral resources of Turkmenistan, Gurbanmyrat Atayew, said to the quests that at the end of 2005 the Turkmen side signed a contract with Gazprom on supply of 30bn cu.m of Turkmen natural gas in the first half of 2006 at 65 dollars per 1,000 cu.m. The scheduled deliveries under this contract will be completed in about two months.

After that, a new contract for the second half of 2006, as well as a new price for the next three years, would have to be considered, Atayew said. Therefore, on 19 June 2006, during a visit of chairman of the Gazprom governing board Aleksey Miller to Turkmenistan, the Turkmen side proposed that the price for Turkmen gas for the second half of 2006 should be 100 dollars per 1,000 cu.m., which would be a perfectly normal price for gas. However, the Russian side offered 65 dollars per 1,000 cu.m. The Turkmen side flatly refused this proposal. Because of this the contract was not signed.

If no contract to this effect is concluded with Gazprom within the next 6 weeks, Turkmenistan will discontinue its gas supplies to the company, Atayew said . The Turkmen side hopes that the Russian side would reconsider Turkmenistan's proposal and show a true understanding.

"As for the Turkmen gas supplies to Ukraine, it currently does not have its own pipelines for transporting gas from Turkmenistan. That is why this issue can be dealt with after the Ukrainian side reaches relevant agreements with the gas transit countries," the Turkmen energy minister said.



gas


Publish

Publish your news

Do you need help with publishing?

/regional publish include --> /regional search include -->

World Topics

Afghanistan
Analysis
Animal Liberation
Anti-Nuclear
Anti-militarism
Anti-racism
Bio-technology
Climate Chaos
Culture
Ecology
Education
Energy Crisis
Fracking
Free Spaces
Gender
Globalisation
Health
History
Indymedia
Iraq
Migration
Ocean Defence
Other Press
Palestine
Policing
Public sector cuts
Repression
Social Struggles
Technology
Terror War
Workers' Movements
Zapatista

Kollektives

Birmingham
Cambridge
Liverpool
London
Oxford
Sheffield
South Coast
Wales
World

Other UK IMCs
Bristol/South West
London
Northern Indymedia
Scotland

Server Appeal Radio Page Video Page Indymedia Cinema Offline Newsheet

secure Encrypted Page

You are viewing this page using an encrypted connection. If you bookmark this page or send its address in an email you might want to use the un-encrypted address of this page.

If you recieved a warning about an untrusted root certificate please install the CAcert root certificate, for more information see the security page.

IMCs


www.indymedia.org

Projects
print
radio
satellite tv
video

Africa

Europe
antwerpen
armenia
athens
austria
barcelona
belarus
belgium
belgrade
brussels
bulgaria
calabria
croatia
cyprus
emilia-romagna
estrecho / madiaq
galiza
germany
grenoble
hungary
ireland
istanbul
italy
la plana
liege
liguria
lille
linksunten
lombardia
madrid
malta
marseille
nantes
napoli
netherlands
northern england
nottingham imc
paris/île-de-france
patras
piemonte
poland
portugal
roma
romania
russia
sardegna
scotland
sverige
switzerland
torun
toscana
ukraine
united kingdom
valencia

Latin America
argentina
bolivia
chiapas
chile
chile sur
cmi brasil
cmi sucre
colombia
ecuador
mexico
peru
puerto rico
qollasuyu
rosario
santiago
tijuana
uruguay
valparaiso
venezuela

Oceania
aotearoa
brisbane
burma
darwin
jakarta
manila
melbourne
perth
qc
sydney

South Asia
india


United States
arizona
arkansas
asheville
atlanta
Austin
binghamton
boston
buffalo
chicago
cleveland
colorado
columbus
dc
hawaii
houston
hudson mohawk
kansas city
la
madison
maine
miami
michigan
milwaukee
minneapolis/st. paul
new hampshire
new jersey
new mexico
new orleans
north carolina
north texas
nyc
oklahoma
philadelphia
pittsburgh
portland
richmond
rochester
rogue valley
saint louis
san diego
san francisco
san francisco bay area
santa barbara
santa cruz, ca
sarasota
seattle
tampa bay
united states
urbana-champaign
vermont
western mass
worcester

West Asia
Armenia
Beirut
Israel
Palestine

Topics
biotech

Process
fbi/legal updates
mailing lists
process & imc docs
tech