Population Held Down by Total Surveillance

Access to the internet, a key link with the world outside, has been steadily reduced and usage is carefully monitored.



There used to be a number of internet providers, but the communications ministry removed their licenses and made the state-run Turkmentelecom the monopoly service provider. Internet clubs and cafes were then forced to close one after another.



Now public access to the web exists only at five resource centres run with the support of foreign organisations. Staff there commonly monitor what visitors are looking at, and stop them accessing banned websites.



An employee of the communications ministry said the government wanted to create what he called an information vacuum. He said the ministry had been required by the National Security Committee to set up a special office which trawls through the internet and decides which sites are acceptable and which are not.



The list of undesirable sites includes opposition organisations in exile and uncensored information about Turkmenistan carried by Russian news sites, but it is always expanding. A translator with a Turkish-run company, for example, was applying for a course at a European university but was surprised to find the institution’s site blocked, for reasons unknown.



Older methods such as phone-tapping keep everyone on their guard. Journalists tell how the phone regularly gets cut off when they are trying to gather facts.



But it is not only media and civil society activists who are under suspicion - servants of the regime seem to be distrusted at least as much. Ministers, regional governors, city mayors and civil servants all have their phones tapped.



This seems to be official policy, as President Saparmurad Niazov often refers to surveillance transcripts at cabinet meetings. At these sessions, extracts of which are carried by official broadcasters, the president exerts control through public humiliation of his subordinates, and backs up his remarks by asking subordinates why they have made certain phone calls, and then gives details of the conversation.



Provincial governors, too, may seem all-powerful, but they too have to watch their backs. The security ministry is constantly listening and watching, and will have infiltrated their administrations or recruited members of their staff.



One former governor described how relieved he was when he left the job, saying he felt he was being watched constantly, and had to make sure he was not doing the wrong thing or meeting the wrong people.



As the frequent arrests of senior officials show, he had good reason to be afraid.