HUMAN RIGHTS AND CIVIL SOCIETY IN TURKMENISTAN
Vienna, 10 June 2002. -- Today the International Helsinki Federation for Human Rights (IHF) in cooperation with the Memorial Human Rights Center (Moscow) held a historic meeting on civil society and human rights in Turkmenistan, one of the most repressive countries in the world.
For the first time ever, exiled Turkmen dissidents and representatives from civic organizations and international human rights groups made a set of joint recommendations to the international community to address the desperate state of human rights in that country.
"The government of President Niazov has obliterated any space for civil society. This is why we had to hold this meeting in Vienna, and not in Ashgabat. In today's Turkmenistan it simply could not happen", said Aaron Rhodes, IHF Executive Director. "The IHF will encourage and support the formation of a Helsinki Committee of Turkmenistan in exile."
The National Security Committee and police strictly monitor all aspects of life, seeking to hold citizens in a constant state of fear.
The Turkmen government tolerates no opposition, represses all critical thinking, imprisons or deports religious figures, and has crushed the most elementary trappings of democratic institutions. Torture is widespread. There is no freedom of expression whatsoever. Only President Saparmurat Niazov can act as the founder of newspapers. The government banned opera, ballet, the circus, and the philharmonia, and closed the Academy of Sciences.
Only two religious denominations are allowed, Sunni Islam and Russian Orthodox Christianity; all others are banned, as are non-Turkmen cultural organizations. A $50,000 fee is required to register a marriage with a foreigner.
The government is seeking to replace the traditional body of national and cultural values with Rukhnama, a book of the thoughts of Niazov, which Turkmen citizens are forced to learn and to which they must swear allegiance.
In 1999, President Niazov had himself declared president for life, and the cult of personality around him has reached grotesque proportions.
The participating groups called for a coordinated policy among governments and multilateral institutions to press for specific human rights improvements.
The complete text is as follows:
Participating organizations call on the international community to work toward the implementation of the following benchmarks by the government of Turkmenistan, which include:
Release political prisoner Mukhametkuli Aimuradov and prisoner of conscience Kurban Zakirov, and reexamine the cases of other individuals sentenced on political and religious charges;
The National Security Committee (KNB) and other law enforcement agencies should cease stifling critical thinking and political and societal activities, and should cease its intervention in citizens' private lives;
Free and fair elections should be held, in accordance with the timetable set in the constitution of Turkmenistan, on the basis of political pluralism and equality of all parties, and under the scrutiny of international observers;
Freedom of expression in Turkmenistan should be guaranteed. This includes, among other things, the unimpeded distribution of foreign media throughout Turkmenistan, an end to unjustifiable barriers to foreign journalists working in Turkmenistan. The government remove obstacles to Internet access and should allow independent providers to operate;
Cases of torture perpetrated by the KNB and police should be investigated by an independent agency. Those found guilty should be punished. Measures should be taken to prevent torture;
Limits on the work of religious organizations that came into effect in 1997 should end;
The state policy of discrimination against national minorities should end, first and foremost in education, employment, language use, participation in the political process, and in the preservation of their respective cultural heritages;
Unfounded obstacles to the registration and activities of civic organizations, political parties, and social movements should come to an end. The government should adopt a new law on public organizations;
Obstacles to freedom of movement, choice of residence, and travel abroad should be eliminated;
Representatives from human rights and humanitarian organizations should be allowed access to the country, and should be granted access to prisons and psychiatric facilities;
The authorities should adopt a law on alternative service, and judicial sentences of those convicted on charges of conscientious objection should be vacated;
The widespread state practice of using child labor in agriculture should end;
Adequate compensation should be provided to those whose homes were demolished in state reconstruction programs in Ashgabat and other cities;
Cases of illegal confiscation of property by the KNB and other law enforcement agencies should be investigated;
Discrimination should end against citizens of Turkmenistan who wish to marry foreigners.
Conference participants also:
Urge all relevant international, nongovernment human rights and humanitarian organizations to undertake a coordinated campaign to raise public awareness about human rights violations in Turkmenistan;
Call on the U.S. Congress and the management of Radio Liberty to arrange special Radio Liberty broadcasts in Russian for listeners in Turkmenistan and other Central Asian states;
Seek the creation of a website devoted to the human rights situation in the "closed" states of Central Asia (Turkmenistan, Uzbekistan, and Tajikistan);
Ask all international organizations, governmental and nongovernmental alike, to press the Turkmen government to strictly comply with its international human rights obligations. This should be the foundation for the conceptualization and implementation of foreign investment and credit grant-driven projects in Turkmenistan. Such institutions should at all stages of their projects solicit the views and expertise of civil society representatives. For further information please contact:
Aaron Rhodes, IHF Executive Director: + 43-1-408 88 22 or + 43-676-635 66 12
Brigitte Dufour, IHF Deputy Executive Director: + 43-676-690 24 57 or + 420-732-162 936
Henriette Schroeder, IHF Press Officer: + 43-1-408 88 22 or + 43-676-725 48 29
Vitalii Pomonarev, Memorial (Moscow): +7-095-200 65 06 or +7-095-432 34 77