Are Anti-Russian Massacres Raging in Turkmenistan?

Turkmenistan President Saparmurat Niyazov issued a resolution according to which people will be severely punished for failure to report about crimes
Russia's television NTV reports with reference to Deutsche Welle that people living in the former Soviet republic of Turkmenistan and holding dual citizenship are deprived of their apartments. National security officers enter apartments by force and evict people living there. At that, people are allowed to take only necessary things and move to their relatives.

A NTV correspondent reports that spontaneous protest actions have been organized in several parts of the Turkmen capital the other day. People deprived of their apartments demonstrated their protest against the arbitrariness of the authorities.  
 
The recent events in Turkmenistan also echoed in the Russian press. Russia's Nezavisimaya Gazeta newspaper published an article under the headline "Turkmen President Jeers at the Kremlin" on its front page. Nezavisimaya Gazeta journalists confirm the information reported by Deutsche Welle about people with dual citizenship evicted from their apartments. At that, the newspaper publishes some details of the scandal: "those apartments where officially registered people haven't lived within the past several days must be confiscated."
 
The Gazeta daily reports that a special service for control over foreigners has been created in Turkmenistan. People visiting the country will be demanded to observe the local laws, defaulters will have to pay large fines.
 
Turkmenistan President Saparmurat Niyazov issued a resolution according to which people will be severely punished for failure to report about crimes; the punishment in this case will be imprisonment for the period of 5-8 years.

The Russian Foreign Ministry hasn't commented yet upon the information reported from Turkmenistan. The other day, Foreign Ministry spokesperson Alexander Yakovenko said that no instances of Russian citizenship disavowal were registered in Turkmenistan. Meanwhile, the Turkmen Embassy in Moscow insists that no instances of eviction of Russian citizens from their apartments in Ashkhabad have been registered. An Embassy spokesperson told RIA Novosti on Friday: "There is no infringement upon the property rights of people holding dual citizenship in Turkmenistan." The spokesperson requesting for anonymity informed that "there was no panic or eviction from apartments in Ashkhabad."
 
 The diplomat calls nonsense the information reported by some mass media saying that people holding no Turkmen citizenship allegedly had no right to have property in the republic. He added that according to the agreement on migrants' rights protection concluded by Russia and Turkmenistan in 1993, "and the agreement is of higher importance than the document on dual citizenship", people wishing to leave Turkmenistan are guaranteed "absolute protection of their property rights." In addition, he said, "today any foreigner has a right to buy an apartment in Ashkhabad."

NTV