Corruption in Turkmenistan

Corruption in Turkmenistan is considered by many independent sources as a serious problem. The country is near the bottom of several annual indices that measure corruption, including The Wall Street Journal's Index of Economic Freedom.

In Transparency International's 2022 Corruption Perceptions Index, which scored 180 countries on a scale from 0 ("highly corrupt") to 100 ("very clean"), Turkmenistan scored 19. When ranked by score, Turkmenistan ranked 167th among the 180 countries in the Index, where the country ranked first is perceived to have the most honest public sector. For comparison with worldwide scores, the best score was 90 (ranked 1), the worst score was 12 (ranked 180), and the average score was 43. For comparison with regional scores, the highest score among Eastern European and Central Asian countries was 56, the average score was 35 and the lowest score was Turkmenistan's, 19.

According to an August 2015 statement by the U.S. Embassy in Turkmenistan, corruption is "widespread in both public and private sectors" in the country. "There are no standards-setting consortia or organizations besides Turkmen State Standards and the licensing agency. There is no independent body for filing complaints. Financial disclosure requirements are neither transparent nor consistent with international norms. Government enterprises are not required to publicize financial statements, even to foreign partners. Financial audits are often conducted by local auditors, not internationally recognized firms."

Turkmenistan's government, the U.S. Embassy states, "strictly controls foreign exchange flows, and the conversion of excess amounts of the local currency, the manat, remains problematic. ... While Turkmenistan has undertaken some initiatives to improve Intellectual Property Rights (IPR) protection, including the creation of the State Agency for Intellectual Property and the signing of some WIPO (World Intellectual Property Organization) conventions, it has not adopted comprehensive administrative and civil procedures to improve the enforcement of IPR." Moreover, "the country's regulatory system is not implemented transparently, and the government has influence over courts' decision-making processes." Owing to these and other problems, Turkmenistan has attracted little investment by American firms.