TURKMENISTAN'S MINISTRY OF CULTURE OPEN TO COOPERATION --

UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 ASHGABAT 000150 SIPDIS SIPDIS STATE FOR SCA/CEN (PERRY) INFO SCA/PPD (VAN DE VATE),IIP/G/NEA-SA E.O. 12958: N/A TAGS: KPAO PREL PINR TX SUBJECT: TURKMENISTAN'S MINISTRY OF CULTURE OPEN TO COOPERATION -- ALONG PRESCRIBED LINES SUMMARY -------------- ¶1. (U) In the first meeting between the embassy and the Minister of Culture in over a year, Minister Enebay Atayeva proved herself a seasoned apparatchik but nervous about appearing too open in this time of political transition. Though she dominated the meeting with rhetoric of cultural nationalism, her suggestions of specific ministry projects and goals provided a context for suggestions of U.S. Government cooperation. Given this and the generally positive history between post and the ministry, the meeting left post with hopes for increased engagement once the presidential election is over. End Summary. READY TO COOPERATE -------------- ¶2. (U) Atayeva spoke during most of this 45-minute meeting, and a couple of times veered off onto unrelated tangents, giving the impression that she wished to block questions or requests from the delegation. Nonetheless, Atayeva outlined continuing priorities for the ministry and proved receptive when delegation members asked if she would be open to further cooperation with the U.S. Government in areas including: international events and festivals; study and propagation of folkloric tradition; theater programs -- including music and dance; and youth arts education and development. Atayeva expressed receptiveness to hosting Fulbright specialists and bilateral exchanges with cultural institutes in the United States. She also expressed a willingness to explore a reopening of the IATP Center once housed at the National Library, in the new National Library-Cultural complex. Throughout, Atayeva was careful to remain vague and noncommittal, but still positive, on prospects for increased bilateral cooperation in the cultural sphere. ¶3. (U) The U.S. delegation included the Department of State's Director of Press and Public Affairs for South and Central Asia Katherine Van De Vate, Division Director for Freedom Support Act Programs Deborah Klepp, representative for the Bureau of Democracy, Human Rights and Labor Catherine Kuchta-Helbling, Public Affairs Officer Andrew Paul and Cultural Affairs Officer Sarah Hutchison; Atayeva was joined by the head of the Ministry of Culture's International Department Agadurdy Akmyradov. ¶4. (U) The practiced but restrained Atayeva led by thanking the U.S. Government for sending the delegation to meet with the ministry. Atayeva sounded brusque when noting that Deputy Assistant Secretary of State Evan Feigenbaum had not met with the ministry but SIPDIS with the Institute of Manuscripts during his visit earlier in January. Van De Vate thanked the minister for her own fruitful meeting at the Institute on January 29, at which post had suggested possible partnerships with the Institute and U.S. specialists or institutions in the United States; she also thanked the minister for her ministry's support of post cultural programs such as the Ambassador's Fund for Cultural Preservation grant program. (Note: The Ministry of Culture has been supportive of most of post's suggested cultural programming and particularly of the Ambassador's Fund Program. End Note.) The minister several times during the meeting invited the delegation to visit Turkmenistan's state-run musical and theater productions, museums and other cultural sites. Van de Vate noted that some delegation members would visit the Kone Urgench historical site in Dashoguz on February 2. Turkmen Pride -------------- ¶5. (U) In response to Van de Vate's question about the ministry's priority areas for development, Atayeva began a soliloquy on the importance of Turkmen culture and national identity to the state of Turkmenistan and a description of recent important ministry projects. Atayeva stated that in any country, its culture was deeply intertwined with the country's history and national identity, and reiterated the Ministry's support for late President Saparmurat Niyazov's plan for the political, economic and cultural development of Turkmenistan until 2020. Atayeva praised Niyazov for his efforts to outline and support Turkmen culture as a way of strengthening the Turkmen nation. ¶6. (U) Akmuradov described a planned April 1-7 theater and folklore festival, for which the ministry said it had issued 30 invitations worldwide for participation. Atayeva named such international festivals and conferences as a priority area for the ministry because "in contrast with previous festivals" this effort will involve groups from the United States, South America and "at least ASHGABAT 00000150 002 OF 003 three to four countries from each continent" to provoke an exchange of ideas and perspectives. (Note: Post has not learned to whom the invitations for U.S. participation have been sent. End Note.) Other international conferences which Atayeva referenced as models of the ministry's goals included a women's conference, a forum on the Turkmen national poet Magtymguly, a Ruhnama conference, a children's art conference, and conference on the cultural heritage in Kone Urgench that marked UNESCO's designation of the site as a World Heritage Site. Atayeva dwelled on UNESCO's high esteem for Kone Urgench and spoke in similar words about Margush (another site supported by an Ambassador's Fund grant). Atayeva said that the Kone Urgench conference prompted the Ministry of Culture to order that a faculty of restoration and preservation be opened at the Institute of Culture; the faculty just accepted its first fifteen students in fall 2006. ¶7. (U) The folklore festival was also illustrative of the ministry's emphasis on traditional dance and music, and Atayeva spoke at length about how traditional forms of art combined with a strong knowledge of national history provide the basis for modern artistic expression. She praised each of Turkmenistan's regions for its distinctive cultural legacy and particularly Balkan Welayat for its highly preserved and "goal oriented" dance traditions. It was difficult to draw a line between folklore culture and national traditions, she noted; through expressions of folk dance and music Turkmenistan's artists expressed "the real Turkmenistan." (Comment: The Minister took this opportunity to describe her attendance at a traditional Lithuanian dance event in Lithuania where she asked a bystander about the dance's meaning. The dance was "monotone" and seemed to have no meaning, and the bystander knew nothing about this expression of his own culture. Such criticisms of other countries or governments is a common theme in conversations with local officials and the Ministry of Education, usually in the context of host government attempts to stymie post programming in the educational sphere. End Comment). ¶8. (U) The construction of several new drama theaters in Ashgabat and the regions and the ministry's continued support for "people's theaters" in the regions was also part of the continuing plan of the Ministry of Culture. Atayeva praised the latter as an expressive outlet for all strata of society, including "housewives, students, doctors and technicians" and noted the ministry's consistent support and guidance of these theaters. (Comment: Post has not seen evidence of such community theaters but assumes Atayeva was making a reference to Soviet-era amateur theater clubs that used to operate through places of work and in communities but that may have been absorbed by formal state structures. End Comment.) ¶9. (U) In keeping with a ministry desire to cultivate a knowledge of Turkmen cultural traditions among the young, the ministry continued to carry out national competitions, originally initiated by a presidential decree, to find the most talented young musicians and other artists throughout Turkmenistan and to showcase their work in theaters. According to Atayeva, the ministry demonstrated its ample support for arts education through its administration of the Institute of Culture, National Conservatory, and art and music vocational and secondary schools throughout Turkmenistan. Atayeva stressed the need to work with students -- those "whose opinions are unformed" and teachers of the Institute of Culture. ¶10. (U) Atayeva shifted from theater to museums, noting that each welayat had a strong regional museum, many of which have unique exhibitions not even found in Ashgabat's National Museum. As part of the new Library-Cultural Center being built in Ashgabat, the complex's museum would display items owned by President Niyazov and describe the development of Turkmenistan in tandem with the rule of Niyazov. IATP -------------- ¶11. (U) At this point Van De Vate was able to get in a word to ask about museum partnerships and then to follow up on post's concern about the eviction of the Internet Access and Training Program site formerly housed at the National Library. Atayeva grew visibly annoyed at the latter question, though she expressed a willingness to look into reopening IATP at the new Library-Cultural Center. The new Center was slated to have dozens of public access Internet terminals as well as a concert hall and the museum. The new library would house 6.5 million items, one million more than the current National Library, making Internet connectivity in the center "essential," according to Atayeva. While the center would open officially on February 16, it would take months to move and ASHGABAT 00000150 003 OF 003 catalogue the entire collection. ¶12. (U) Clearly eager to close the meeting, Atayeva embarked on an speech on the importance of women leaders, telling a couple of joking anecdotes to suggest that men were irrelevant. She also made a disjointed attempt to draw a connection between her view and Turkmen national culture, suggesting that Turkmen culture values women's judgment as equal to or often exceeding that of men. Atayeva closed the meeting by agreeing enthusiastically to a suggestion that post meet again with ministry officials to discuss particular programs and urged Emboffs to route plans through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs via a diplomatic note as is customary. COMMENT AND BIOGRAPHIC NOTES -------------- ¶13. (SBU) Atayeva arguably is the second highest ranking woman in the government after Parliamentary Speaker President Akja Nurberdiyeva (septel). Both during the Niyazov's funeral and at the February 2 40-day wake ceremony at the Gypjak national mosque, Atayeva and Nurberdiyeva were given special duties to accompany Niyazov's family. During a January 11 remembrance day event observing the 1881 massacre of Turkmen by Tzarist troops at Gokdepe, Nurberdiyeva led the female government officials and diplomatic corps representatives to the balcony of the mosque. Atayeva sat to her right and the Deputy Governor of Ahal Province to her left. The Minister of Education Shemshat Annagylyjova sat past the various handmaidens down to the far left; and nobody talked to her. ¶14. (U) Atayeva, in office since late April, 2006, is herself an alumna of the International Visitor Leadership Program (she participated in the 1999 program Agricultural Trade: Food Safety and Regulation) and, as she proudly stated, has a broad range of professional experience. While a pediatrician by training, she has served as Minister of Finance and Economics, Minister of Social Welfare, Hakim of Ahal Welayat (from which position she was dismissed for unspecified "shortcomings") and as Chairwoman of the state-run Women's Union. (Note: The Deputy Minister of Culture is an alumnus of the State Department's TV-COOP program; post is currently following up on a program for the coming year, having received a proposal from state television. End Note.) ¶15. (SBU) That Atayeva expressed a desire for expansion of ministry efforts in arts education leaves open the possibility that post can offer a Fulbright Senior Specialist to work with the Institute of Culture. Such a specialist could be based either at the Institute, a vocational school, or the conservatory to assist in broadening the scope of instruction in the visual arts, music or theater, develop institute or school administrative capacity, or to assist in curriculum of the new archaeology/conservation department, among others subject areas. ¶16. (U) Post is thinking along similar lines for educational or research institutes under other ministries, such as the Agricultural or Medical Institutes, vocational schools and institutes, as well as scientific institutes. Post can also work within the folklore, arts festival and youth development goals or target areas to create programs of common interest that would be available both to the audience within the research, educational and public institutes of the Ministry of Culture, as well as to an unfiltered public audience through the American Corners and Public Affairs Section outreach events. One idea is to bring a Native American dance troupe to participate in the April folklore festival, which could then to travel to the regions for independent programs with young audiences. ¶17. (U) While the minister was not pleased with the mention of IATP, she did not reject the suggestion that IATP operate within the new library. These positive signs, mixed with the minister's heavy dose of nationalistic rhetoric, suggests that though attitudes within the ministry will take a long time to evolve to create a real dialogue and openness with post, nonetheless the ministry has revealed several common interests which post can use to expand its cooperation in the cultural sphere. End Comment. BRUSH