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Russian-led group declares Turkmen vote fair
By ALEXANDER VERSHININ,Associated Press Writer AP - 2 hours 48 minutes ago
ASHGABAT, Turkmenistan - A Russian-dominated group on Monday called Turkmenistan's parliamentary election free and open, but critics said the vote in the Central Asian nation was a sham and disputed the official turnout figure.
The parliamentary poll Sunday was the first since the death in late 2006 of idiosyncratic leader Saparmurat Niyazov, who ruled the former Soviet republic and natural gas-rich nation with an iron fist for more than two decades.
Turkmenistan's energy riches have make it a target of courtship by both Russia and the West. Moscow has lobbied in recent years to sign long-term supplies of Turkmen gas, while the U.S. and Europe are seeking to decrease Russia's dominance over export routes.
"The election of parliamentary deputies was held in accordance with the country's election laws and generally accepted standards for democratic elections," said Sergei Lebedev, a Russian who is executive secretary of the Commonwealth of Independent States.
The CIS assessment of the elections echoed Turkmen government statements about the vote. Niyazov's successor, President Gurbanguli Berdymukhamedov, has sought to cast it as an important step in boosting democratic standards.
In a shift, all 125 parliament seats up for grabs were contested. But most of the 288 candidates came from the country's only permitted political party, and none were opponents of the president. All appear to have run on a platform of support for Berdymukhamedov.
The Turkmen Initiative for Human Rights, an exiled group operating from Europe, dismissed the vote as undemocratic. It disputed the official turnout figure of 94 percent of the country's 2.8 million voters in a report on its Web site, claiming real turnout may not have exceeded 30 percent.
"All the markets and shops were operating as normal. Almost all shopkeepers and many customers were either unaware of the election, or did not consider it necessary to take part," the group said.
The CIS, made up of 11 former Soviet republics, has in the past given positive assessments of several former Soviet elections criticized by Western governments. The Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe, which includes the United States and European nations in addition to former Soviet republics, did not send a full-fledged monitoring mission to this election.
Election officials said results would be announced by Wednesday.
In the meantime, state media reported Monday that lawmakers have approved a revision to the national anthem that removes all references to Niyazov _ the latest sign that authorities are gradually dismantling Niyazov's pervasive personality cult.
Niyazov called himself Turkmenbashi, or father of all Turkmens. He issued bizarre decrees and made a spiritual tome he wrote mandatory reading.
___
Associated Press Writer Peter Leonard contributed to this report from Almaty, Kazakhstan.
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