Turkmenistan Bars Students From Leaving Country Ahead Of Census

ASHGABAT — Turkmen college students set to check overseas are being barred from leaving the nation at Ashgabat Worldwide Airport, mother and father and eyewitnesses say.

It’s not clear what number of college students have been affected by the motion, which started in September, however one eyewitness informed RFE/RL that college students have been being eliminated by migration officers from foreign-bound flights “en masse.”

Some Turkmen assume authorities are reluctant to let residents depart the nation forward of a December census that comes amid an unprecedented inhabitants decline in Turkmenistan of hundreds of thousands of individuals.

The authoritarian authorities in Ashgabat hasn’t publicly introduced any “ban” or defined why college students will not be allowed to fly overseas. However eyewitnesses say migration officers mentioned they’re solely stopping college students who research — or have enrolled — in universities whose diplomas will not be acknowledged in Turkmenistan.

In April 2019, Turkmenistan printed a listing of overseas universities whose levels are accepted by its Training Ministry. The checklist contains dozens of universities in Russia, China, India, and Turkey, in addition to a handful of faculties in Kazakhstan, Ukraine, Belarus, and Georgia.

But it surely by no means mentioned Turkmen will not be allowed to check in overseas colleges whose diplomas it doesn’t acknowledge.

The most recent ban comes forward of a deliberate census in December. A minimum of two preliminary authorities surveys lately have reportedly indicated a extreme demographic disaster in Turkmenistan.

In 2020, the federal government put the nation’s inhabitants at 6.2 million. However a ballot in 2021 discovered that the variety of individuals dwelling in Turkmenistan was some 2.8 million, three officers near the survey informed RFE/RL on situation of anonymity on the time.

The outcomes of the survey haven’t been made public.

In Could 2019, a number of sources near the federal government informed RFE/RL that almost 1.9 million individuals left Turkmenistan between 2008 and 2018 both for everlasting residency overseas or for everlasting work outdoors the nation. The figures did not embrace Turkmen labor migrants working overseas.

The officers mentioned this exodus from the poverty-stricken secretive state, a falling beginning fee, and rising mortality figures have been among the many essential causes behind the disaster.

Many extra individuals have left Turkmenistan as worldwide flights resumed not too long ago after being suspended for greater than two years due to the coronavirus pandemic. RFE/RL correspondents in Ashgabat reported lengthy strains on the consular part of the Russian Embassy final month ready for Russian visas.

A number of individuals ready in line mentioned they wished to maneuver to Russia regardless of the financial and political implications of its brutal conflict in Ukraine.

Most Turkmen face hardship at house because the nation has been grappling with a significant financial disaster that features meals shortages, power unemployment, and skyrocketing inflation for a few years. The repressive authorities in Ashgabat additionally deprives individuals of their rights and freedoms because it seeks to regulate all points of society.

Turkmen officers have up to now routinely eliminated individuals from worldwide flights with out giving any legitimate purpose. It led to widespread corruption, with some individuals allegedly paying between $2,000-$5,000 bribes to migration officers at airports to have the ability to depart the nation.

Households of a number of the college students affected by the newest unannounced ban say they needed to pay a steep bribe in order that their youngsters may depart.

One household from Ashgabat informed RFE/RL that that they had paid a “sure sum of money” to migration officers, who then allowed their daughter to board a aircraft a couple of days in the past to proceed her research in Russia. The mother and father — who spoke on situation of anonymity — mentioned their daughter’s college isn’t included on Ashgabat’s checklist of authorized overseas colleges.

Many others, nonetheless, “are in a determined scenario” because the motion has left their youngsters dealing with an unsure future, an Ashgabat mother or father mentioned. It’s unknown if the households get a refund for the tutoring on the universities or for his or her unused aircraft tickets.

Turkmen authorities didn’t reply to RFE/RL’s request for remark.

Written by Farangis Najibullah in Prague based mostly on reporting by RFE/RL correspondents in Ashgabat.