Turkmenistan: in a pre-trial detention center women pay in kind for comfort

A girl from Turkmenistan spent several years in the female prison of Dashoguz province. At the moment, she managed to leave the country for Turkey. She was prosecuted on a far-fetched charge of prostitution. She agreed to tell us her story. To maintain confidentiality, we will not publish the name of the city, the number of the detention center, no names. At home, our interlocutor left relatives who could be in danger.

– Please, tell us how your misadventures began?

– From the prosecutor of our city. He wanted to make me a second wife. I refused, and he sent me to prison for prostitution. It didn’t even help me that I had a child of two years old. He was not moved by the tears and pleas of my parents. My dad and mother were kneeling in front of him, and asked him to spare me. I did not have a lawyer, and there was no court either.

– How is this even possible?

– The lawyer was not allowed, and the trial was held without me. I was just read out the court decision in the detention center and transferred to the colony, where all the documents were seized from me.

– And how was the investigation conducted? Who conducted the interrogation?

– There was no investigation and there were no interrogations either. I sat in the pre-trial detention center for about 3 months and then went to the colony.

– Did you and your relatives try to defend yourself somehow? Did you write complaints to the Prosecutor General’s office or somewhere else?

– We wanted to, but I had to give up everything. They threatened to put my father in prison for many years, and send my son to an orphanage. And I wouldn’t have left prison alive.

– You said that you spent about 3 months in a pre-trial detention center. Can you tell us about the life of women in jail?

– There were eight women in the cell. One sat for lack of money, she had worked as a cashier. The others and I were there for prostitution. One of the women was 4 months pregnant, she had the hardest time. The cell was small (4 meters long and 2.5 meters wide). The toilet was inside the cell. There was one small window with tight bars. We washed ourselves in turn from a plastic bottle directly into the toilet; there were no sink. We were on duty in the cell in turn. The attendant was supposed to take food, sweep the floor in the cell, but we rarely swept because half of the floor in the cell was not covered. Getting up at 6 a.m., at 9 o’clock there was a shift re-examination and check of cameras, recount of all prisoners. Lunch was given exactly at 12:30. However it was impossible to call food. Bread was like plasticine, soup consisted of only water with sour tomato paste. Instead of tea, they gave brewed camel’s thorn. Twice a week, they gave us smelted pilaf cooked in unrefined cotton oil. Several times, sprats were served in tomato sauce, pasta without anything and borsch from spoiled vegetables. Dinner was at 18 o’clock. Very often for dinner they gave what was left of lunch. Lights-out was exactly at 10 p.m. My parents brought me food twice a month, we shared products, soap, toothpaste and tampons with each other. Only at the checkpoint they opened all the packages with tampons and put them into a plastic bag, opened everything that was packed and even cut vegetables and fruits into several parts. In the summer, food spoiled very quickly and we just threw away a lot of things or gave to other cells.

– Was the toilet in the cell equipped? Was there a toilet sink? Was the flush working? Were the doors to the toilet closing?

– Doors? There were no doors. The toilet consisted of a toilet sink, mounted in concrete. There was no toilet cistern, each cell had five-liter plastic bottles from drinking water. So we used these bottles for washout. A toilet was just a toilet sink fenced on one side with one-meter high brickwork.

– And what about the smell?

-We took out cotton from mattresses and set fire to it. There was a smell of pungent smoke in the cell, and no smell of feces.

– Have you been in the cell all the time?

– No, once a day we were taken out for a walk for 15-20 minutes and driven back to the cell. There were no walks on Sunday.

– Is there a bathhouse or a shower in the pre-trial detention center? And how often have you been taken to wash?

-Yes, we were taken to the shower once a week, given 30 minutes for washing. Often the girls asked to give an additional 15 minutes, sometimes they were allowed us to wash a little longer, but then we seemed to get to heaven. With the another new convicts, a very beautiful girl arrived, who often went to the head of the pre-trial detention center in the office for fun and games. Then they started giving us boiling water for tea at any time. We could wash, when we wanted without restriction. They could send sergeants to the store, and the chief himself brought her everything she wanted.

– Were any girls raped or tortured?

– No, at least I didn’t see such a thing in jail. It was bad for the men when riot police arrived. They were beaten with batons just for intimidation. They beat them very hard and even broke one’s arm. They didn’t even take him to the hospital. The surgeon was brought to the pre-trial detention center and he put the arm in plaster in the cell.

– How was the situation with medical help in jail?

– No way. Relatives brought all the medicines. There were no free medicines in the infirmary and you had to pay for all the services of a doctor. There were medicines, but prisoners had to buy them. They could give an injection with expired drugs for free, or give expired pills for free, no other.

– How did they treat you personally at the jail?

– Very well! When they brought me to the pre-trial detention center, the chief called me and said that he had seen my relatives and that I would not have problems in the pre-trial detention center, that no one would even touch me with a finger. Then I learned from my mother that my dad came to jail and paid the boss $1500. My parents sold the cow and borrowed some money from relatives. This amount was enough only for my safety in the pre-trial detention center.

 – And what about those, who did not have money?

 – Adult women were not touched, and young girls were forced to sleep with the jail staff in order to eat, drink, smoke cigarettes, etc.

 – How often did girls have to do this?

 – Well (long pause), the girls basically went into the office of the jail duty officers for the night. They prepared a snack and set the table. The drinking bout continued all night. Some girls said that they had to serve several times a night and several officers. Some of them later cried out for hours. We reassured them as best we could. They brought them into the cell before rising. For the service, the girls were given Turkmen churek, the snack that remained after drinking bout, cigarettes and coffee (she gave a deep sigh).

 – In the summer in Turkmenistan, the air temperature rises to +45 degrees. Were there any cooling systems in the detention center cells?

 – There were no systems there (laughter). It was difficult when the neighboring cameras were being repaired. Two women were transferred to our cell. They were sleeping on the concrete floor, and the mattresses in the detention center were very thin. We were suffocating in the cell. The pregnant woman lost consciousness, and several times overnight, we threw water on her. First, we paid for installing the fan in the cell, and then we used it for free thanks to the girl from Ashgabat who was the mistress of the head of the pre-trial detention center.

 – What else did you pay in jail?

– Absolutely for everything. If I say that we used something for free, then for this free one of the girls paid in kind. Everything has a price.