Turkmenistan President Gurbanguly Berdymukamedow Bans sale of Tobacco Products

 

Gurbanguly Berdymukamedow,the president of Turkmenistan has upped the ante on Anti-Smoking Lawsthis week by banning the sale of all tobacco products in the country.

Shops in the country can apparently now face fines to the tune of $1,700 if caught selling cigarettes. Of course, this isn't exactly stopping things in their tracks—already, the sale of cigarettes on the black market has risen to over $11 a pack

The Turkmen media is totally controlled by the government. Reporters Without Borders list Turkmenistan as the country with the third-worst press freedom in the world, with only North Korea and Eritrea ranked as more repressive. (Under President for Life Sapamurat Niyazov, who died in 2006, all TV transissions began with an oath that the broadcaster's tongue would shrivel if he spoke ill of the country, its flag, or the president

This isn't the first time the subject of smoking has come up in the country—Berdymukhamedow is frequently seen in PR shoots riding a bicycle or doing similar healthy activities and has led an aggressive anti-smoking campaign country-wide. At the beginning of January, he removed Atadurd Odmanov, the head of the State Service for Protecting the Security of a Healthy Society, from his post as Colonel for failing to effectively coax Turkmenistan's smokers to stub out.

Last July, the World Health Organization (WHO) declared Turkmenistan had the lowest rate of smokers in the world, with only 8 % of the population recorded as tobacco users.

Yet, with such restrictive media laws inside the country, we’re a little skeptical about those figures