TURKMENISTAN'S 16TH INDEPENDENCE DAY: THE PAGE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 ASHGABAT 001164 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR SCA/CEN, DRL, EEB PLEASE PASS TO USTDA DAN STEIN E.O. 12958: DECL: 10/29/2017 TAGS: PGOV PHUM ECON EPET SOCI EU RS TX SUBJECT: TURKMENISTAN'S 16TH INDEPENDENCE DAY: THE PAGE HAS TURNED Classified By: CHARGE RICHARD E. HOAGLAND FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) AND (D) ¶1. (C) SUMMARY: Rather than simply a family picnic in the park to watch fireworks, Independence Day in Turkmenistan was really Independence Week (and more) -- an elaborate, undeniably expensive, and highly choreographed series of events calculated to extol Turkmenistani contemporary sovereignty and cultural heritage. Notably absent from the October 27 official events was any reference to former President Niyazov and his "Ruhnama." But neither was there an excessive emphasis on current President Berdimuhamedov. Russian oil and gas delegations muttered they had been called to Ashgabat simply for photo ops. EU ambassadors, who declined to attend several of the events -- "Been there, done that," one commented -- said they hoped to make Berdimuhamedov's November 5-7 visit to Brussels a "wake-up call" for him, a strategy we judge might be counter-productive. END SUMMARY. BELOVED SOVIET-ERA TURKMEN MOVIES REHABILITATED ¶2. (SBU) The October 27 Independence Day in Turkmenistan was really Independence Week, beginning with the presidential ribbon-cutting for the new high-rise Ministry of Culture and Broadcasting just down the street from the Presidential Palace complex in the center of Ashgabat. The evening ceremony on October 17 was an over-the-top extravaganza of the magenta-lit 20-story building, a laser light show, fireworks erupting out of the building, and -- probably most important -- large screens projecting beloved Soviet-era Turkmen movies that former President Niyazov had banned because they were Russian-made. When they first came on the screens, the surprised crowd cheered and some of the older folks wept. President Berdimuhamedov's brief speech exhorted Turkmenistanis to remember, celebrate, and advance "true Turkmen culture -- take the best from the past and add the best from the modern world." ¶3. (U) Subsequent events throughout the week saw many ribbon-cuttings, including for a huge new residential complex on the southern edge of Ashgabat, and a new cotton spinning factory just to the west of Ashgabat, in Abadan City a few kilometers past Gypjak Mosque and Niyazov's mausoleum. During the entire week, there were no ceremonies at the mosque or mausoleum. EXTOLING THE NATION, NOT THE MAN ¶4. (SBU) The main festivities began on Independence Eve at the 60,000-seat "Olympic Stadium" with a "people's concert," which was really a highly choreographed precision show of thousands of students in color-coordinated outfits forming on the field the various symbols of independent Turkmenistan, including the flag, the great seal, and other designs, concluding with major fireworks shooting off the canopy root of the open-air stadium. German Ambassador Hans Mondorf commented that the students had rehearsed for only a month, instead of six months as was done under Niyazov. "But it still looked like North Korea," he sniffed. ¶5. (SBU) October 27 events began at dawn with a wreath-laying at the Monument to Independence, locally known among the Turkmenistanis as the Toilet Plunger because of its design. President Berdimuhamedov arrived precisely at 8:00 am. He laid his wreath, followed first by key ASHGABAT 00001164 002 OF 003 representatives of society, including the Great Patriotic War (WWII) veterans and a representative of the Russian Orthodox Patriarchate. The top echelons of the government participated, as well as the entire senior military leadership, the diplomatic corps, and at least 5,000 citizens waiting to lay their huge bouquets. (COMMENT: We'd love to know who had the monopoly for the multiple planeloads of cut flowers imported from Holland for use through the week. END COMMENT.) NO NIYAZOV, NO RUHNAMA ¶6. (SBU) The 10:00 am parade on Presidential Palace Square was radically different from previous years, mercifully shorted from five to two hours -- one hour for military troop and equipment formations, a brief interlude of traditional horsemen (followed by an orange-vested pooper-scooper brigade),and a final hour of floats and marchers emphasizing current government policies: health, education, agriculture, oil and gas, and telecoms. The oil and gas float featured an electronic map with blinking routes for future export pipelines -- east to China, south through Afghanistan to Pakistan and India, and west across the Caspian Sea through the Caucasus states to Turkey and onward to Western Europe. Notably absent were any of the existing northward pipelines, including the planned enhancement of the Caspian littoral pipeline. ¶7. (SBU) Probably most important, there was not one mention or image in the parade of either former President Niyazov or his "Ruhnama." It was as if they had never existed. ¶8. (SBU) The most interesting act at the afternoon state concert in the 3,000-seat Ruhiyet Palace, which no Western ambassador attended (except the Charge),was entitled, "My Pride is Independence." Elaborately choreographed, it began with traditionally dressed and bearded khans extolling pre-Russian 19th-century life, followed by an earnest early 20th-century Turkmen intellectual who had bought into the Russian policy to civilize and modernize the benighted Turkmen only to be betrayed by the Russian Revolutionary Communist Commissars barking out the new laws banning Turkmen customs, forbidding the practice of Islam, and shutting all mosques. RUSSIAN OIL AND GAS DELEGATIONS IRKED BY "PHOTO OPS" ¶9. (C) Ashgabat was over-run with invited delegations. The chief-guest foreign delegation was from Ukraine (NOTE: A color-revolution country. END NOTE),led by the Ukrainian Foreign Minister. Four delegations President Berdimuhamedov met with on October 26, Independence Eve, raised some eyebrows -- Gazprom, Itera, the Russian Union of Oil and Gas Industry, and TNK-BP. AmCit President and CEO of Joint Stock Company TNK-BP Management, Robert Dudley, told Charge it seemed to be a bit of a charade. All had arrived from Moscow for "command performances" with Berdimuhamedov, who stacked them up in his ante-rooms "like cord wood," Dudley said, for what were little more than photo ops. ¶10. (SBU) Among the 23 official delegations tracked by Foreign Ministry Protocol were a large number of doctors from Germany, the Ashgabat-Albuquerque Sister City delegation, and the "Friends of Turkmenistan," an evangelical group from San Diego that reportedly has long been in the good graces of ASHGABAT 00001164 003 OF 003 Ashgabat. THE POLICE STATE IS GONE, THE NANNY PATROL RELAXES ¶11. (U) On Independence Day itself, Berdimuhamedov attended only the wreath-laying ceremony and the parade. After the parade, he strolled with minimal security from the reviewing stand through the public parks toward the Earthquake Monument where one of his Mercedes Maybachs was waiting for him, although he didn't stop to press the flesh and work the crowds. ¶12. (SBU) State protocol was surprisingly relaxed with the diplomatic corps, possibly because they were over-taxed with visiting delegations. Instead of providing an anxiously hovering nanny patrol, they simply told diplomats, when they were even present, "You know what to do. Go ahead." EUROS WANT TO "LAY DOWN A MARKER" FOR RAPID CHANGE ¶13. (C) At the surprisingly informal -- and relatively brief -- evening reception for the government, diplomatic corps, and business and national delegations at an old Soviet-era restaurant-nightclub (not one of the new marble palaces),the EU ambassadors clumped together. German Ambassador Mondorf opined that Berdimuhamedov's November 5-7 visit to Brussels will be "difficult," because the EU ambassadors in Ashgabat have sent a unanimous recommendation to Brussels that Berdimuhamedov's EU interlocutors press hard that he reform the economy, modernize the visa regime, release all remaining political prisoners, establish independent media, and fully compensate the Turkmen-German investors for their expropriated chicken farm. ¶14. (C) COMMENT: Although the day was long and sometimes tedious for a Western observer, we were struck by the lack of obvious ideological content in the events -- especially by the total lack of any reference to Niyazov and "Ruhnama." The only steady emphasis was on Turkmen cultural heritage. We would judge that the EU Ambassadors' desire to "lay down markers" for Berdimuhamedov in Brussels might be counter-productive. Better to observe closely what is changing, encourage the positive changes, nudge where appropriate, and have the patience to move for the most part at Turkmenistan's speed, as long as it is generally in the right direction. Anything else would be interpreted here as arrogance. END COMMENT. HOAGLAND