2024-09-06 12:35:00
To the President of the Republic of Turkmenistan
Mr. Serdar Berdimuhamedov
The President’s Palace
74400 Ashgabat, Turkmenistan 05.09.2024
President Serdar Berdymukhamedov, Mr.
We write to you, the undersigned, to express our grave concern regarding Turkmenistan’s continued failure to respect the fundamental rights of its citizens to freedom of movement and the practice at Ashgabat International Airport of removing passengers from flights without author. We recommend that you pay immediate attention to the following violations.
One particularly troubling example is Turkmenistan’s refusal to allow family members of government critics to travel abroad. On April 3, 2023, 74-year-old Yakutzhan Babajanova was denied permission to leave Turkmenistan to perform Umrah (lesser Hajj) as part of a group of pilgrims. Yakutzhan Babajanova is the mother of Hamida Babajanova, a 49-year-old ethnic Uzbek from the Dashoguz region of Turkmenistan who has lived in Turkey since 2016 and is known for her critical statements on social networks. Border guards did not allow Mr. Babajanova to board a flight from Ashgabat to Istanbul. On April 23, she was not allowed to leave the country again. It was only in August 2023, after the incident drew the attention of international organizations, that the unfounded travel ban was lifted. However, the case of an unfounded travel ban was repeatedly made with Hamida’s other relatives. Her two sisters, Khurshida and Dilfuza, were refused permission to leave Turkmenistan: one to Turkey in February 2024, and the other to Uzbekistan in April 2024. In response to requests to the State Migration Service of Turkmenistan, they received official confirmation of the travel ban without specifying its reasons or duration. When they contacted the same agency in person, they were informed that their third sister, Firuza Babajanova, was on the “black list” of people not allowed to travel.
On July 15, 2024, the activist’s daughter, Sadokat Nurimbetova, a second-year student at the Turkish Medipol Medical University, was not allowed to leave the country to study in Istanbul. On July 23, she contacted the Turkmen migration service in writing. There is no answer yet. Post offices in Dashoguz and several districts in the region refused to accept complaints from the Babajanovs to the Office of the President, the Ombudsman and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs. On August 1, in Ashgabat, security guards did not allow them to enter the Migration Service building.
There is reason to believe that Babajanova’s freedom of movement is being restricted as “punishment” for her speeches. In this regard, on July 29, Hamida circulated a YouTube video message to the President of Turkmenistan.
Bans on relatives of activist Hamida Babajanova are not the only case of unjustified restrictions on the travel of Turkmenistan citizens abroad. On August 12, 2024, at Ashgabat airport, border guards did not allow 20 students to board the plane, and on August 28, 60 people flew to various educational institutions in Turkey to study.
According to the three students who were prevented from leaving, migration officials said that the university in Turkey had stopped its activities, which is not true. It was another inappropriate reference to a list of nine international universities that Turks are encouraged to study at. Local officials interpreted this list as a ban on studying in other institutions, which violates the Turks’ right to education. At the same time, some mediators offer young people between $2,000 and $4,000 to settle the matter, after which the travel ban is lifted.
These examples, in addition to the general practice of border services to unreasonably restrict freedom of movement, show a systematic disregard for the Constitution of Turkmenistan, human rights and the international obligations to which it is subject.
President Serdar Berdymukhamedov, Mr.
We ask you to take immediate measures to remove illegal restrictions on foreign travel for relatives of Hamida Babajanova and students studying in Turkey who were not allowed to fly in the summer of 2024. We also ask the authorities of Turkmenistan to take all measures that consistent with their obligations under international human rights law to respect, protect and realize the right to freedom of movement in accordance with Article 12 of the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights and Article 13 thereof. the Universal Declaration of Human Rights.
With hope,
1. Tadzhigul Begmedova, Turkmen Helsinki Foundation for Human Resources, Bulgaria
2. Farid Tukhbatullin, Turkish Human Rights Initiative, Austria
3. Tolekan Ismailova, Public Association Movement for Human Rights “BirDuino”, Kyrgyzstan
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