For most expats, Turkmenistan or for the purposes of this exercise its capital Ashgabat, would not rank highly on a list of locations they expect to find themselves. The hydrocarbons sector is heavily underpinned by foreign nationals brought in by countries sitting on a wealth of gas and oil, and accounts for a significant proportion…
Turkmenistan: Why some keep friends in low places
In a world connected by data, rolling news, and instant messaging there can be little excuse for ignorance. Drilling down into almost any conceivable issue within modern society and those redolent of another age is as easy today as can be imagined, but the devils of fake news, hearsay, and online maliciousness remain very much…
Turkmenistan: A presidential portrait of modern-day narcissism wrapped in despotism
In 2004 the Harvard Business Review called it right. Their take on narcissists concluded that the vainglorious are "unproductive when, lacking self-knowledge and restraining anchors, they become unrealistic dreamers. They nurture grand schemes and harbour the illusion that only circumstances, or enemies block their success". Does all this sound terribly familiar, even in the modern…
Turkmenistan: Promoting the President’s Son to State Governor another step towards dynastic hegemony
Nobody really knows if Serdar Berdymukhamedow has the makings of a statesman, or indeed if he has ever demonstrated the requisite qualities. For anyone promoted to Provincial Governor within his or her homeland one would presume they already possess the necessary acumen and temperament for such a role but this is Turkmenistan, where nepotism and…
Slight of Hand and Cardboard Facades fool few in Berdymukhamedow’s Turkmenistan
It is unclear how Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedow has concluded that his country is now a net producer of wheat whilst many of his citizens are forced to queue for basic foodstuffs. Does this then mean that Turkmenistan is exporting wheat, and perhaps other comestible component parts to neighbouring or otherwise unnamed nations for a…
Turkmenistan: The Hypocrisy of Food Shortages and Presidential Excess
In the world and mindset of a confirmed, unabashed dictator normal rules have long since gone out of the window, assuming of course that they ever applied in the first place. Only in a country whose throat is being kept under the boot of its protector, and predestined guide, can food shortages directly contributing to…
Turkmenistan: Will the European Union take to the floor to dance with the devil?
Not content with treating his own citizens with contempt Turkmenistan president Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedow now appears to have the European Union (EU) on a string, if reports of an upgrade from its current liaison office to a permanent mission in the nation's capital Ashgabat are to be believed. Quite what the EU want with and in…
Turkmenistan: When seeing is not believing in a land of (totalitarian) pretence
The continued bizarre, contrary modus operandi of Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedow again highlights the former dentist's despotic hold over the former Soviet republic. Self-styled as a deity predestined to shepherd the nation to greatness through his many initiatives that often amount to little more than yet another Potemkin-esque, white elephant construction project, Berdymukhamedow's absolute grip…
Turkmenistan: Can Berdymukhamedow get what he came for from US visit?
It is as of yet unclear if recent US policy prohibiting the acquisition of Turkmenistan cotton has taken effect, or if it amounts to little more than lip service without actual implementation. Nevertheless, for the central Asian republic such publicity regarding its vital cash crop can only be bad, highlighting in the strongest terms the…
Turkmenistan: Caspian Sea agreement will benefit few of its beleaguered citizens
Urban Dictionary define the term "bananas" as ...something crazy, ridiculous. It is therefore highly appropriate that a country such as Turkmenistan, one with an unstable, North Korea-lite despot at the controls is in the process of growing its first ever crop of the yellow fruit. Whether the former Soviet republic can be described as a…
Turkmenistan: President Berdymukhamedow Raps while his Countrymen Sing for their Suppers
Fiddling while Rome burns has always been the preserve of emperor Nero, although the idiom that in effect describes a focus on the trivial while issues of greater importance are left unattended has been adopted on countless occasions by those, in modern parlance, who seek to control the controllables, rather than address the more pertinent…
Alpine Adventures, Soccer, Central Asian Autocracies & Secessionist Politics 