TURKMENISTAN BLOCKS RUSSIAN-LANGUAGE INFORMATION

ASHGABAT, July 12 (RIA Novosti) - Turkmenistan has nipped retransmission of Russian-based Mayak radio casts throughout the country. The Russian Embassy addressed the host Ministry of Foreign Affairs with a note that demanded urgent explanation of the reason. A reply has not come to this day, reports Andrei Krutko, Russia's charge d'affaires ad interim.

Mayak FW, MW and wire broadcasting was suspended Saturday last, July 10, and experts cannot say just when it may resume.

As far as the Turkmen Information Ministry knows, wire casting of three national channels plus the Mayak had to stop with equipment wear-and-tear. Thus, reference amplifiers had got out of order altogether.

As the Watan (Motherland) radio-national Channel One-had no FW and MW frequencies of its own, a decision was made to take up the Mayak's MW and 103.2 megahertz FM frequencies, announced the ministry.

With daily average 18 hour casts, the Mayak had been extremely popular with Russian-and Turkmen-speaking audiences.

The national radio casts in Turkmen alone, and the Mayak had been the country's only Russian-language channel. Now, the population has lost whatever access to information from Russia but for satellite antennae. Russia's television Channel One has a mere two hours a day, with no live casts, and subscription to Russian periodicals was banned in July 2002. Russian speakers are in a formidable information blockade.