The Turkmen are a Sunni Muslim people whose language, Turkmen, belongs to the southwestern, or Oghuz, branch of the Turkic linguistic group. In 1997, about 3.6 million Turkmen lived in the Central Asian country of Turkmenistan, with smaller numbers...

This article is about the Turkmen people of Turkmenistan. For the distinct group of Turk peoples of Iraq see Iraqi Turkmen. For the group of people in Turkey, see Turkish people. See also disambiguation page Turkmen for other uses of the term. The...

SPECIAL FOCUS CASE Political speech can be a precarious activity in Turkmenistan. In January 2004 Gurbandurdy Durdykuliev wrote to Turkmen President-for-life Saparmurat Niyazov to request permission to protest peacefully in the main square of Balkanabad, in western Turkmenistan. Durdykuliev had criticized Niyazov's policies...

The suffering of 3 million Turkmen under the Iraqi dictatorship of Saddam Hussein has been as acute as the privations of the Kurds and Shiites, as well as compounded by Kurdish persecution. The latter, nevertheless, are protected under the wings of the United...

Turkmenistan's security minister has promised that his forces will preserve calm in the Central Asian country following the death of longtime authoritarian leader Saparmurat Niyazov, newspapers reported Saturday.In a statement published in state-run newspapers, Lt. Gen. Geldimukhammed Ashirmukhammedov vowed to pursue policies set forth by...

Turkmenistan's security minister has promised that his forces will preserve calm in the Central Asian country following the death of longtime authoritarian leader Saparmurat Niyazov, newspapers reported Saturday.In a statement published in state-run newspapers, Lt. Gen. Geldimukhammed Ashirmukhammedov vowed to pursue policies set forth by...