POPULATION 4,688,963
SUNNI MUSLIM 89 percent
EASTERN ORTHODOX 9 percent
OTHER 2 percent

Country Overview

Introduction

Turkmenistan, a desert country in southwestern Central Asia, borders Afghanistan and Iran to the south, Uzbekistan to the east and northeast, Kazakhstan to the northwest, and the Caspian Sea to the west. For millennia it was the home of agriculturists and pastoral nomads. Arab invaders brought Islam to the area during the seventh and eighth centuries C.E., and by the tenth century most Turkmen had converted to Islam.

In 1884 Turkmenistan (then Turkmenia) became a colony of Tsarist Russia. The Tsar's military administration built a railway, allowed a massive migration of Christian Orthodox Russians into the newly subjugated territories, and displaced the indigenous ruling elite.

Russian policies were hostile to Islam and generated considerable opposition from the Turkmen. By 1920 the Soviets had occupied Turkmenistan and installed Communist administrators, declaring it the Turkmen Soviet Socialist Republic in...