[CivilSoc] Komarovsky Released, Pledges to Continue Fight Against Turkmenbashi Dictatorship

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Following is the opening section of a longer article on Turkmenistan
published online in RFE/RL's 29 July 2003, Volume  4, Number 18 issue of
"(Un)Civil Societies".  It was prepared by Catherine Fitzpatrick and can be
viewed in its entirety at: http://www.rferl.org/ucs/2003/07/18-290703.html.
Among several measures the article suggests to support reform in
Turkmenistan are (a) denying the megalomaniacal "Father of All Turkmen" (and
presumably other high officials) the ability to travel to the West, and (b)
investigating the contracts signed with Turkmenistan by Western firms such
as J.C. Penney, GAP USA, Tommy Hilfiger, and Walmart in the U.S., and
Bouygues Batiment in France. The latter was reported by Russia's ITAR-TASS
news service in February to have contracts with the Turkmen government in
excess of one billion dollars.
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FREED FROM TURKMENISTAN'S JAILS, FORMER PRISONER VOWS TO KEEP UP FIGHT FOR
FREEDOM...
Leonid Komarovsky, a Russian-born American businessman, is a man with a
mission. Since his release last April after spending five months in jail in
Turkmenistan, he has vowed to keep fighting for the freedom of his
colleagues still in prison and to expose the evils of the regime of
"Turkmenbashi" (Father of all Turkmen), as Turkmen President Saparmurat
Niyazov is known. Komarovsky denies the charges against him of helping to
instigate a violent coup against the president and says he and other
activists took part in a "peaceful demonstration" which was intercepted by
the secret police and portrayed as an assassination attempt. Many Western
diplomats and observers believe a coup attempt was in fact foiled, but say
that prisoners' confessions have been obtained under torture and the "show
trials" of the suspects were reminiscent of the Stalin era. They say the
case has been used to settle scores with opponents and to deal a blow to a
growing organized opposition in exile finding support within Turkmenistan.
Last week, Komarovsky and a group of exiled Turkmen officials and
human-rights activists finished a tour of European capitals to advocate more
attention to oppression in Turkmenistan and to propose sanctions (see below)
in an effort to compel Turkmenistan's regime to liberalize. Komarovsky spoke
with "(Un)Civil Societies" from France, where he met with senators, foreign
ministry officials, nongovernmental organizations, and the media to
complain, among other things, about French President Jacques Chirac's
embrace of Niyazov at the ceremony in honor of the 300th anniversary of St.
Petersburg -- a gesture he and other opponents of the regime say only
fortifies Niyazov's resolve to keep political prisoners in jail.
Komarovsky and his colleagues also conveyed a similar message in Austria,
the Netherlands, and Great Britain: Western European governments and
multilateral institutions must begin to consider the same type of measures
they have used on dictators such as Alyaksandr Lukashenka of Belarus and
Robert Mugabe of Zimbabwe who, for at least a short time, found themselves
and their associates on a visa ban list. Komarovsky and former Turkmen
officials who have defected have supplied Western governments with names of
officials they would like to see investigated for possible self-dealing on
loan agreements with private entities. For example, more than 162 million
euro has been invested since 1994 on the development of hydrocarbon reserves
and other projects in Turkmenistan by the European Bank for Reconstruction
and Development (EBRD). Among these are loans to Gap-Turkmen, which has also
entered into contractual relations with international retailers and apparel
producers, including J.C. Penney, GAP USA, Tommy Hilfiger, and Walmart in
the U.S. Because of its control of the economy, the Turkmen government
benefits from such projects, exiles say.
In recognition of the challenges faced by human rights violations and the
absence of democracy in Turkmenistan, the EBRD's investment is small, in
contrast, with other nations in transition. The bank says it is withholding
broader cooperation with the Turkmen government, and in a strategy statement
on its website (http://www.ebrd.com), notes that the bank "will be focused
on the promotion of private sector activities...provided it can be shown
that the proposed investments are not effectively controlled by the state or
state entities and government officials will not personally benefit from
such investments."
Komarovsky and other campaigners are urging governments to investigate
private firms in France, Turkey, and elsewhere that do business with
Turkmenistan to examine allegations of padded accounting by Turkmen involved
in their projects and to use whatever leverage they had to call for the
release of political prisoners.
Komarovsky--a long-time former correspondent for "Stroitel'naya gazeta"
(Construction Newspaper) and contributor to other Russian newspapers as well
as a frequent business traveler to Turkmenistan involved in computers and
software--is knowledgeable about the way business is conducted in
Turkmenistan. He told French audiences that Turkmenbashi even became
personally involved in choosing the type of cement a French firm was to use
in building a mosque. (The French builders Bouygues Batiment have projects
exceeding a billion dollars in Turkmenistan, according to an 18 February
ITAR-TASS report). The anecdote is indicative of the lack of a real private
sector in Turkmenistan and the degree to which all foreigners fall under
state control and cannot be certain their projects are conducted properly...
[ ... for the rest of this story please go to:
http://www.rferl.org/ucs/2003/07/18-290703.html ]
Other online sources of information about Turkmenistan suggested by
(Un)Civil Societies include:
* "Flight from Ashgabat: Russians Desperate to Leave Turkmenistan Face
Bureaucratic Nightmare," by Ata Atmanov, in "Reporting Central Asia" of the
Institute for War and Peace Reporting. Atmanov is the pseudonym of a Turkmen
journalist.
http://www.iwpr.net/index.pl?archive/rca/rca_200307_220_1_eng.txt
* Sites operated by Turkmen exiles and their sympathizers containing news
and views from opposition groups in English and Russian include:
http://www.erkin.net; http://www.gundogar.org; http://www.dogryyol.org