Largest mosque in Central Asia near Kipchak, Turkmenistan, can hold 20,000. Photo by Carpetblogger, 2005, who said it was empty at mid-day.
This is disturbing news -- citing Radio Ozodlik, fergananews.com reports that video surveillance cameras have been installed in all the mosques in Namagan.
"There are 30 mosques in Namagan, and cameras have been installed in all of them, and not just one camera but several in various parts of the buildings and in the courtyards," a source told Radio Ozodlik in Uzbekistan. "Imams say that this is done in order to protect believers from thieves, of which there are simply too many."
Thieves? Really? What do they steal, shoes?
Ozodlik asked the local Muslim administration about the cameras, but they didn't have any explanation. Another imam had a more plausible idea:
According to the famous imam Rashod-kori Kamolov, the reason is the intent by the local authorities to watch what is going on during prayers, to follow what imams are saying to believers, and see whether young people are attending prayers.
Uzbekistan has the largest population of Muslims in the former Soviet Union and Namangan is the third-largest city.
Says Wikipedia, while noting everywhere that "citations are needed,"
Kazakh authorities are doing the same thing, says fergananews.com.
Authorities in Alma-Aty have placed surveillance cameras in all the mosques there. Here's what the mayor says, tengrinews.kz reports:
"We place great attention on the struggle against the propaganda of terrorism and extremism. In some mosques, video surveillance camers have been installed. The akim of the Medeus district has taken the initiative into his own hands. Together with businessmen, he is placing surveillance cameras in public places. We also call for them. In 2012, about 2,000 video surveillance camers will be put throughout the city," Esimov explains.
Do the Chinese help them with this?
Recently, the Kremlin made a big fetish of placing video cameras in all the polling stations. Far from ensuring transparency against fraud, this was a dodge by a tyrant to in fact put pressure on voters -- and actually accomplish nothing, as voting fraud doesn't always take place literally in front of a camera placed by an "urn," as the Russians aptly call their ballot boxes where their votes are thrown away and turned to ash.
It seems like a bad idea to put cameras in mosques and intrude on people's privacy and it likely won't really stop any terrorist plots anyway. What terrorist is going to plot in front of a camera? And if the imam is giving an incendiary homily that attracts young people, haven't you already lost those young people if they found it attractive and you didn't educate them in peace and tolerance long before that?
These issues can be complicated -- there is a debate raging about the New York Police Department running surveillance on Muslim believers even outside their jurisdiction, in neighboring states. They didn't do this through cameras, but through police informants and spies going to prayers and even going on a youth rafting trip. It seems to me the Muslim communities who have been invaded in this fashion are right to be indignant and even demand justice for the violation of their rights.
On the other hand, there are some mosques terrorists have attended and gotten their "spiritual guidance" there, or have been "talent-spotted" by extremists frequenting the mosque, like the Brixton Mosque in the UK, attended by the "shoe bomber". But if this is a mosque attended by 500 people, why should the fact that one of them turned violent justify video camera surveillance or police spies?
I don't think ensuring "happy childhoods" and "ending poverty" are going to fix terrorism, nor will the violation of basic civil rights. There does need to be a debate on this. I think rather than having Muslim indoctrination films and police spies, probably the police have to hire Muslims from new immigrant communities just like the police has always done from time immemorial from immigrant communities, and put them in charge of community affairs so that they deal with issues in an appropriate manner.
We always have a police van outside our church during Mass on Sundays. Maybe the police show up for every large gathering of hundreds of people? Or maybe they are just there to handle the inevitable old person fainting from a heart attack or stroke? Since everyone knows the policemen and they are members of the parish themselves no one seems to think anything of it.
But it's vexsome that just because of one incident that occurred last year, our church now has to be locked up promptly after the 12:00 so that no visits can be made during the afternoon. The reason is that a homeless man attacked an usher with a stick one day when he was asked to leave. The church fathers had been fairly lenient allowing homeless to sit in church, but once once of them lunges at someone with a stick they stopped their leniency.
Another thing that both Central Asian tyrants do (like southern preachers?) is build giant mega-places of worship. Mega-churches are a time-honoured American tradition and I'm all for them, it's freedom of religion. More than anything, they seem to go with the doctrine of "prosperity," i.e. that Jesus will help you get rich.
In Turkmenistan and Tajikistan, they seem to be borrowing both a page of "Soviet gigantism" as well as hoping to drive believers all in to one big place where they can keep tabs on them better.
"Soviet gigantism," for those who don't keep up with dictator chic, are these giant elaborate buildings in the former Soviet Union designed to dwarf the individual and make him seem insignificant. They're especially effective if they have huge avenues and squares all around them to dwarf him even further. They were also part of a concept of "building communism" by having large edifices to symbolize the communist state's might.
Recently, Berdymukhamedov announced he would build mosques to hold 3,000 in the cities of Turkmenbashi and Konye-Urgench, AP reported. And there are plans for one in Balkanabat, says turkmenistan.ru and even an international tender. (Qatar helped Tajikistan build its big mosque.)
Actually, these aren't so mega -- the largest mosque in Central Asia is part of the Turkmenbashi complex where past dictator Saparmurat Niyazov is buried, in Kipchak, outside of Ashgabat. That's funny, given that he once said there were "too many" mosques.
Another photo of the Turkmenbashi mosque by Nathan Groth, 2010.
