Today, the State Migration Service of Turkmenistan in Ashgabat hosted a ceremony of handing over passports of a citizen of Turkmenistan to stateless persons and residence permits to foreigners.
In accordance with the decree signed by President Serdar Berdimuhamedov the day before, 1,530 stateless persons – representatives of 26 nationalities – received Turkmen citizenship.
The separate presidential resolution has authorized granting residence permits to 315 citizens of 9 countries and representatives of 23 ethnic groups.
The event was also attended by Chairman of the State Migration Service of Turkmenistan Nazar Atagarayev, Dmitry Shlapachenko, UN Permanent Coordinator in Turkmenistan, UNDP Permanent Representative in Turkmenistan Narine Sahakyan, Head of the OSCE Center in Ashgabat, Ambassador John McGregor.
The high-ranking participants of the ceremony praised the efforts made by the Government of Turkmenistan to prevent and reduce the level of statelessness in the country.
Turkmenistan is the only country in the Central Asian region that is a party to all four conventions on statelessness.
Furthermore, Turkmenistan has a National Program for the Elimination of Statelessness for 2018-2024, with the goal of completing the task of eradicating statelessness by the end of the program.
To date, 28,167 people who live in the country and have no any other citizenship, have been accepted into the citizenship of Turkmenistan.
4,438 foreign citizens and stateless persons have a residence permit. ///nCa, 24 September 2022