International fact-finding mission looks into alleged assassination attempt on Turkmen President

WARSAW, 14 February 2003 - An international fact-finding mission established to examine the investigations by the Turkmen authorities of the 25 November assassination attempt on President Saparmurat Niyazov began its work this week.

In view of conflicting reports of the circumstances surrounding this assassination attempt and the way the investigation is conducted, a group of ten OSCE States invoked the Organization's so-called Moscow Mechanism last December. This rarely used instrument, adopted in Moscow in 1991, provides for the deployment of expert missions to examine human rights concerns in OSCE countries.

The ten States - Germany, United States, Austria, Canada, United Kingdom, Greece, Ireland, Italy, Norway, and Sweden - appointed Emmanuel Decaux, Professor of International Law at the University of Paris, to look into all human dimension matters relating to the conduct of the investigations following the assassination attempt on president Niyazov and the circumstances surrounding it. The mission will prepare a report as requested under the Moscow Mechanism.

The mission welcomes any information relevant to its mandate. Such information can be transmitted through the OSCE's focal point for fact-finding missions under the Moscow Mechanism, within the OSCE Office for Democratic Institutions and Human Rights in Warsaw. The contact person is Lydia Grigoreva, Human Rights Officer, e-mail: office@odihr.pl, tel.: +48-22-520 06 00.