TURKMENISTAN POLICE CLAIM INDIVIDUALS MUST "BELIEVE ALONE"
By Jeremy Reynalds (08/19/05)
Following a raid on a registered Baptist church in Turkmenistan, Anti-Terrorist Branch police summoned church leaders twice-the second time for a "more thorough interrogation."
The church was in the north-eastern town of Dashoguz. Forum 18 News Service learned about the incident from unnamed sources.
Turkmenistan is located in Central Asia, bordering the Caspian Sea, between Iran and Kazakhstan (www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/tx.html).
The interrogation took place at the 6th Department for Combating Terrorism and Organized Crime, Forum 18 reported.
According to Forum 18, church leaders were warned that the Baptist Church's national registration with the Adalat (Fairness or Justice) Ministry in the capital Ashgabad is "not valid for northern Turkmenistan,"a claim that Baptists strongly dispute
(see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=623).
As unregistered religious activity is illegal in Turkmenistan, Forum 18 commented that the claim of the 6th Department (which has responsibility for terrorism and other organized crime) implies that any organized activity by the congregation would be considered to be illegal.
The same claim has been repeated to a variety of faith communities by other police departments outside the capital, Forum 18 reported. Barring unregistered religious activity breaches Turkmenistan's international human rights commitments.
Officers warned church leaders that they had no right to hold church services or to corporately read the Bible in the countryside, and that such activity was an offence. They said that without registration of the congregation in Dashoguz, the congregation cannot meet or spread its
faith.
"Individuals can only believe alone on their own at home," Forum 18 reported that police warned.
Forum 18 reported the news service was told that police questioning the church leaders were unable to find Article 11 of Turkmenistan's constitution, which reads in part, "Everyone shall have the right independently to define his attitude toward religion, to profess any religion or not profess any either individually or jointly with others, to profess and disseminate beliefs associated with his attitude to religion, and to participate in the practice of religious cults, rituals, and rites" (For the full text see the Forum 18's Turkmenistan religious freedom survey at www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=296).
According to Forum 18, police pressured the church leaders to write statements on how they had become Christians, why they had copies of the Bible and why they read it. They were also pressured to sign a declaration that the church would not meet until it had obtained state registration.
"We met for worship before ‘your registration' existed, and will continue to meet now we have registration, even if you did not recognize it," Forum 18 reported church leaders told the police. "And we will continue to meet in future, as our faith does not depend on registration."
Trouble began for the Turkmen-language Baptist congregation after an open-air Sunday service on Aug.14 near the town.
"The church traveled out into the countryside with the aim of holding a service outside the walls of a private flat, to praise God and read the Injil, the Word of God," Forum 18 reported one Baptist told the news service. "It was a purely Turkmen service in the Turkmen language." After the service, church members intended to share a meal of Plov, a local rice dish, but no sooner was the food ready than "uninvited guests appeared from nowhere."
About ten police officers, some in uniform and some in plain clothes, questioned the church members about what they were doing. Forum 18 reported sources told the news agency the officers confiscated all the Turkmen-language Bibles and hymn books owned by church members.
The officers were very interested in the children present, asking why they were there and whether permission from their parents had been obtained. "To their great disappointment," one source told Forum 18, "their parents were present with the children, as they too are believers."
According to Forum 18, officers drew up an official report listing those present and recording the confiscated books.
Asked by church members to identify themselves, Forum 18 reported, only three of the ten police officers did so. They were Bahram Hasanov, head of the detective Criminal Investigation Department for Niyazov region (which includes Dashoguz), Orazgeldy Kurbanbaev of the 6th Department for Combating Terrorism and Organized Crime, and local police Inspector Hairula Rahimov.
Forum 18 reported that registered Baptists in the eastern towns of Turkmenabad (see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=535) and Mary have also had their services attacked by police - in the latter case anti-terrorist police - and similar claims were made in both cases that the congregations are in fact unregistered (see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=623).
The country's so-called 2004 "liberalization"of state religious policy, in particular announced changes in registration policy, was greeted by some outside observers with optimism. But many religious believers within Turkmenistan, Forum 18 reported, viewed the announcement with scepticism (see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=390).
Experience since the "liberalization" tends to confirm the view of the sceptics, Forum 18 reported. Continued strong official pressure has been used against registered communities of Baptists, as well as other officially registered religious communities, such as Seventh day Adventists, Pentecostals and Hare Krishna devotees (see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=582 ).
Forum 18 commented that registered congregations are pressured to honor "the extreme cult of personality" surrounding the country's president, Saparmurat Niyazov, who likes to be called Turkmenbashi, or Father of the Turkmens (see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=522).
Strong official pressure also continues to be used against unregistered - and de facto illegal - communities, such as those from the Baptist Council of Churches, whose congregations refuse on principle to register with the state authorities in post-Soviet countries
(see www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=621).
For more background, see Forum 18's Turkmenistan religious freedom survey
at www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=296
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