Satellite images reveal mass forced evictions in Turkmenistan
About 50,000 or more people have been forcibly evicted from their homes as part of a push to “beautify” the capital of Turkmenistan ahead of the 2017 Asian Indoor and Martial Arts Games, personally overseen by the President.
This is stated in the press release published by the Amnesty International referring to the satellite images showing the extent of the devastation.
The Amnesty International’s analysis of satellite images shows that 5,000 houses, each home to an average of five people, were destroyed in the Choganly neighbourhood near the capital of Turkmenistan, Ashgabat, during March 2014-April 2015.
%%GALLERY%%
Furthermore, the entire neighbourhood comprising more than 10,000 houses was entirely razed to the ground by September. The fresh demolitions are continuing in other areas of the capital rendering many families homeless.
Despite the fact that the Amnesty International and other human rights monitors are barred from the country, the researchers corroborated details of the evictions depicted in the satellite imagery with testimony from phone interviews and other confidential sources.
It should be noted that President Berdymukhamedov has personally overseen the development projects in a bid to modernize Ashgabat ahead of the Games, organized by the Olympic Council of Asia.
“Instead of using the Games as an opportunity to clean up Turkmenistan’s human rights record, local authorities there have only succeeded in worsening living conditions for residents, many of whom had moved to Ashgabat from the countryside in search of work or had already been evicted elsewhere,” said Denis Krivosheev, Amnesty International’s Deputy Programme Director for Europe and Central Asia.
The human rights organization calls on the Turkmenistan’s government to immediately put an end to forced evictions and illegal demolitions, compensate the victims and give them access to adequate alternative housing urgently.
