TURKMENISTAN: HARE KRISHNA PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE FREED

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Tuesday 24 October 2006

TURKMENISTAN: HARE KRISHNA PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE FREED WITH RESTRICTIONS

 

Hare Krishna devotee Cheper Annaniyazova - who has served one year of a

seven year jail term - has been allowed to return to her home under

restrictions as part of the annual prisoner amnesty, Forum 18 News Service

has learnt. She was jailed on three charges, two of which related to

leaving Turkmenistan illegally. The third charge has never been made

public, and sources within Turkmenistan think she was jailed for her

religious beliefs. Others who did the same thing as her have not been

punished, she has stated. Cheper Annaniyazova, who has the religious name

Caitanya Rupini, has to report daily to the police, and it appears

unlikely that she will be allowed to travel abroad for at least four

years. No recent news is known of former chief mufti Nasrullah ibn

Ibadullah, sentenced to 22 years' imprisonment in March 2004.

 

TURKMENISTAN: HARE KRISHNA PRISONER OF CONSCIENCE FREED WITH RESTRICTIONS

 

By Felix Corley, Forum 18 News Service <http://www.forum18.org>

 

Hare Krishna devotee Cheper Annaniyazova was freed from the women's labour

camp in Dashoguz [Dashhowuz] in northern Turkmenistan on the morning of 19

October, as part of the country's annual prisoner amnesty, Forum 18 News

Service has learnt. She has now returned to her family in the capital

Ashgabad [Ashgabat]. "Of course we're all very pleased to have her home,"

sources close to her case told Forum 18 News Service on 21 October.

However, she remains restricted in her rights.

 

Sources told Forum 18 that Annaniyazova has to report daily to the local

police in Ashgabad and is unlikely to be allowed to travel abroad again

for at least four more years. "But this is less important - the main thing

is that she is now back at home," sources told Forum 18.

 

Her release came as part of the amnesty declared by President Saparmurat

Niyazov at the end of the Muslim holy month of Ramadan. Official sources

say that 10,056 prisoners were due to be freed, including "almost all"

female prisoners. It remains unclear whether Annaniyazova was obliged to

swear the oath of loyalty to the president on a copy of the Koran as other

prisoners freed in the amnesty are supposed to do.

 

The oath of loyalty reads in translation: "Turkmenistan, you are always

with me in my thoughts and in my heart. For the slightest evil against you

let my hand be cut off. For the slightest slander about you let my tongue

be cut off. At the moment of my betrayal of my motherland, of her sacred

banner, of Saparmurat Turkmenbashi [Father of the Turkmens] the Great

[i.e. President Saparmurat Niyazov], let my breath stop."

 

Annaniyazova, who was born in 1968, was one of the first people in

Turkmenistan to become a Hare Krishna devotee. In 2002 she sought an exit

visa to be allowed to leave to travel to Kazakhstan to live at the Hare

Krishna temple in Almaty, but was refused. However, she went anyway. It

was after her return to Turkmenistan in May 2005 that she was arrested for

illegally crossing the border, although exit visas had by then formally

been abolished. However, the exit blacklist was not and has not been

abolished (see F18News 31 May 2006

<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=790>).

 

Cheper Annaniyazova (who has the religious name Caitanya Rupini) had

served a year of a seven-year sentence imposed under three charges, two of

which related to illegally crossing the border three years ago when she

went to Kazakhstan to live at the Hare Krishna temple in Almaty (see

F18News 17 November 2005

<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=690>). The third charge was

not made public and the extra sentence imposed in the wake of the

accusation was likewise not made public, though the sentence she received

exceeds the maximum penalty possible under the known accusations.

 

It is thought within Turkmenistan that the heavy sentence was imposed at

the behest of the MSS (Ministry of State Security) secret police, in order

to intimidate the Hare Krishna community (see F18News 5 December 2005

<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=699>). Many others who did

what Annaniyazova did were not charged, she stated (see F18News 17

November 2005 <http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=690>).

 

No recent news has been heard of former chief mufti Nasrullah ibn

Ibadullah, sentenced to 22 years' imprisonment in March 2004 at a closed

trial in Ashgabad. The Turkmen government has refused repeated

international requests to make the verdict public (see F18News 8 March

2004 <http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=271>).

 

The Hare Krishna community is one of the registered religious communities

within Turkmenistan. However, many within religious communities doubt

whether registration makes any real improvement to their situation in

practice (see F18News 24 May 2006

<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=787>). Unregistered

religious activity remains - against international human rights standards

- illegal. (END)

 

For a personal commentary by a Protestant within Turkmenistan, on the

fiction - despite government claims - of religious freedom in the country,

and how religious communities and the international community should

respond to this, see <http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=728>

 

For more background, see Forum 18's Turkmenistan religious freedom survey

at <http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=672>

 

A survey of the religious freedom decline in the eastern part of the

Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) area is at

<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=806>, and of religious

intolerance in Central Asia is at

<http://www.forum18.org/Archive.php?article_id=815>.

 

A printer-friendly map of Turkmenistan is available at

<http://www.nationalgeographic.com/xpeditions/atlas/index.html?Parent=asia&R

oot

map=turkme>

(END)

 

© Forum 18 News Service. All rights reserved. ISSN 1504-2855

You may reproduce or quote this article provided that credit is given to

F18News http://www.forum18.org/

 

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