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| Caucasus/Russia/Central Asia |
| US warns Turkmen leader |
| 2007-12-12 |
| The United States has urged Turkmenistan to take more active steps to improve human rights protection and review jail sentences handed down under the nation's previous leader. Turkmenistan has been emerging slowly from self-imposed isolation since last year's death of President Saparmurat Niyazov, who ruled the Central Asian state for 21 years. Niyazov's successor, Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov, has promoted closer ties with the West and vowed to push ahead with fundamental reforms. But international human rights groups say many Niyazov-era laws are still limiting civil freedoms. "I think we need to continue moving forward," Deputy U.S. Assistant Secretary of State Erica Barks-Ruggles told reporters in the capital Ashgabat over the weekend. She urged the government to review prison sentences handed down by closed courts under Niyazov, who jailed many of his opponents. "If people are going to be charged, they are to be tried and charged by an open court and if they are not, they need to be released," Barks-Ruggles said. |
| Posted by:lotp |
| #2 It's just not the same since the Turkmenbashi mysteriously died. Sigh... |
| Posted by: gromky 2007-12-12 11:01 |
| #1 Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov Doesn't really roll off the tongue, does it? |
| Posted by: bigjim-ky 2007-12-12 10:42 |