Turkmenistan holds mass exercises, defies coronavirus concerns

Source:AFP Published: 2020/4/8 18:58:40

Authoritarian Turkmenistan gathered thousands of citizens for mass exercise events to mark World Health Day, state media said, ignoring the global trend for social distancing to fight the spread of the coronavirus pandemic.

General view of Lebap Province, Turkmenistan after a rain on March 31 Photo: VCG

The Central Asian country is one of those that claim they have no cases of the virus which is sweeping across the globe.

A state television broadcast late on Tuesday showed hundreds of people wearing identical colored tracksuits cycling in close formation on a cold, damp day in the capital Ashgabat.

Another sequence showed state employees including medical staff doing stretches inside and outside government buildings.

State media said 7,000 citizens participated in cycling events across the gas-rich country to celebrate the date, which has been marked internationally since 1950.

President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov was shown riding a horse and biking with a small group of officials.

Turkmenistan has yet to register a case of the novel coronavirus that has killed more than 82,200 people worldwide, despite sharing a border with Iran.

A separate state news report on Wednesday said authorities were building a hospital to treat infectious diseases in the Akhal region that surrounds Ashgabat but did not mention COVID-19.

Berdymukhamedov mentioned the coronavirus publicly for the first time on April 3 in a speech where he talked about the economic threat posed by the pandemic. 

Turkmenistan and Tajikistan both sent children back to school this week.
Newspaper headline: Mass games held free of virus concerns


Posted in: ASIA-PACIFIC

blog comments powered by Disqus