Registan’s Turkmenistan News & Analysis Archive

Officially neutral, Turkmenistan is somewhat unique in Central Asia. While it is an active member of the international community, it goes to great pains to avoid being seen as closely aligned with any other government. Following independence, President Saparmurat Niyazov adopted the name Turkmenbashi, Leader of Turkmens, and created an elaborate cult of personality that included renaming some months and days of the week after himself and family members and the compulsory study of his spiritual and philosophical book, The Ruhnama. After Niyazov’s death in 2006, new president Gurbanguly Berdimuhammedov rolled back many elements of Turkmenbashi’s personality cult, but he has governed the country in much the same way, keeping outsiders at arm’s length from the people of Turkmenistan.

Between them, Registan’s authors have years of experience working on issues related to Turkmenistan in academia and for corporate and government organizations. Registan puts that experience to work to offer research, analysis, and training services tailored to your individual needs. For more information on how we can help you and your organization better understand Turkmenistan and Central Asia, visit our services page.

Central Asia Monitor 1.19

by Central Asia Monitor

Tajik Ministry of Justice Moves Prison Out of Central Dushanbe A Dushanbe prison which holds approximately 2,000 prisoners will be moved out of the center of Tajikistan’s capital and to the near-by city of Vahdat. The Dushanbe prison was built in 1935 and designed to hold up to 1,500 prisoners.  According to a source at the Tajik [...]

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Central Asia Monitor 1.18

by Central Asia Monitor

Kyrgyzstan to reopen investigation into ethnic Uzbek journalist’s murder Kyrgyzstan has launched a new investigation into the murder of ethnically Uzbek independent journalist Alisher Saipov, according to RFE/RL. Saipov was shot dead in the southern city of Osh exactly 5 years ago. Many believe he was killed as a result of his journalistic work, which [...]

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Central Asia Monitor 1.17

by Central Asia Monitor

Russian Handbook for Central Asian Labor Migrants Causes Offense A Russian manual for labor migrants from Central Asia has stirred up controversy due to its allegedly racist content. “Instructions for Labor Migrants,” printed in St. Petersburg by the NGO Look to the Future, depicts a group of migrants as anthropomorphic construction tools traveling around the [...]

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Russia’s Putin eyeing military dominance in Central Asia amid water quarrels

by Elmurad Kasym

Water wars Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan are landlocked and mountainous countries—75% and 90%, respectively—in Central Asia. The countries’ mountains provide abundance of potable water, which feed the two major rivers of Central Asia.  The scarcity of other natural resources understandably results in Bishkek’s and Dushanbe’s attempts to use the water more wisely—building hydropower plants (HPP) for [...]

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Central Asia’s Stupid Conspiracy Shuffle

by Joshua Foust
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It’s something of a fact of life for people who work in and study Central Asia that rumors, groundless speculation, and conspiracy theories rule the day. It’s how an untrue rumor can metastasize into something horrible and violent in very short order: after all, if my friends are saying it, then it must be true! [...]

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Conditions Inside Turkmenistan

by Joshua Foust

Last week I recored an interview on Bloggingheads with “Adalat,” who runs Alternative Turkmenistan News, about conditions inside the country. I also really badly mangled the name “Berdimuhamedov” on more than one occasion! Topics include: Adalat’s life as an exiled Turkmen dissident Turkmenistan, a nepotistic kleptocracy Why do abuses in Turkmenistan get so little attention? [...]

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The Warming of the Caspian Cold War

by Casey_Michel
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The Caspian Sea first crept into the world’s cognizance sometime in 1873. Utilizing machinery constructed in nearby Bibi-Heybat Bay, jutting to the south of Baku, oil workers installed the world’s first offshore and machine-drilled wells, setting their engineering skills on the viscous black gold roiling underneath the Absheron peninsula. Gas-lit lamps and foreign nationals soon [...]

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Small World, After All

by Casey_Michel
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An interesting, if bizarre, refrain one hears over in Central Asia is that the post-Soviet space was remarkably untouched during the 2008-09 economic crisis that rocked the rest of the developed world. Due to its distance, its diversity, and its diligence, Central Asia remained an unscathed bastion of economic prowess, testament to the ruling and [...]

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Has War in Afghanistan Ruined Central Asia?

by Nathan Hamm
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While Central Asia’s international political profile has risen considerably since 2001, it has primarily been seen in the West through the prism of Afghanistan. The policies of Western governments towards Central Asia as a whole and as individual states have widely fluctuated, but in almost every case, been heavily shaped by policies toward Afghanistan. US [...]

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Focus on the “Social” in Social Media

by Nathan Hamm
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Earlier this week, Small Wars Journal published an article by Matthew Stein, a research analyst currently working at the Foreign Military Studies Office at Fort Leavenworth, Kansas, discussing the role of videos recorded and posted by citizen bystanders in the information battle to control the narrative over the police’s violent crackdown on protesters in Zhanaozen [...]

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