What with municipal elections here in the Kingdom, recent elections in Iraq, people power in Lebanon, the promise of constitutional change in Egypt and the Palestinian Parliament flexing its muscles, the state of democracy in the Middle East is very much the focus of international attention. The same cannot be said about Central Asia. The world is apparently not much concerned about what happens in these former Soviet republics, all of which are Muslim-majority, some of which have the potential to rival the Middle East because of their massive oil and gas reserves, and one or two of which are unreconstructed neo-Stalinist dictatorships on a par with North Korea.
Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan are relatively democratic. Both held parliamentary elections just six days’ ago. However, they were hardly free and fair. Opposition candidates were barred and there are allegations of electoral fraud. In the case of Kyrgyzstan, OSCE monitors say the contest “fell short” of international standards.
But it is Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan where concerns about human rights curtailments and the state of democracy are much stronger, especially the latter. Turkmenistan is a one-man state — the one man being President Saparmurat Niyazov. No opposition is tolerated. Its members are in jail. Allegations of torture abound. It is not only the opposition that is banned. Niyazov has just banned medicare outside the capital. All hospitals outside Ashgabat have been ordered to close. Apparently, “The Father of All Turkmens,” as Niyazov likes to call himself, does not see the point in them. Last year he sacked thousands of medical workers, giving the job to army conscripts. Now he says that those who are ill can come to the capital. In a country the size of Iraq, where the only alternative is treatment from an uneducated army private, this is draconian. Not even Saddam Hussein went that far. It is not Niyazov’s only lunatic command. Rural libraries have just been closed on the grounds that the rural population cannot read.
To say that he is a megalomaniac is an understatement. The personality cult that he has built up outstrips that even of that other grand isolationist, North Korea’s Kim Jong Il. His picture is permanently on the side of TV screens, his birthday the country’s main public holiday, and gold statues of him abound. His book “Ruhnama” (a collection of his personal spiritual musings) is prescribed study in all schools and an entrance requirement to university. He has even renamed the days of the week and the months, the latter after national heroes, starting in January with himself; April is named after his mother. Islam is attacked by Niyazov’s aggressively secularist government, although over 90 percent of the population is Muslim. Mosques are rigorously controlled and Muslim opponents languish in jail.
Given this situation, one would expect Turkmenistan to be near the top of President Bush’s agenda of promoting democracy. But it is not. Is that because of past offers by Niyazov to Washington to use Turkmenistan’s airspace against anti-Taleban operations in neighboring Afghanistan?
