The Armed Forces of Turkmenistan, known informally as the Turkmen National Army is the national military of Turkmenistan. It consists of the Ground Forces, the Air Force and Air Defense Forces, Navy, and other independent formations.
Iran has a long paved road system linking most of its towns and all of its cities. In 2011 the country had 173,000 kilometres (107,000 mi) of roads, of which 73% were paved. In 2008 there were nearly 100 passenger cars for every 1,000 inhabitants.
The Karakum Desert, also spelled Kara-Kum and Gara-Gum, is a desert in Central Asia. Its name in Turkic languages means "black sand": "kum" means sand; "kara" is a contraction of garaňky: "dark" or may pre-date that in this language family. This refers to the shale-rich sand generally beneath the sand of much of the desert. It occupies about 70 percent, 350,000 km2 (140,000 sq mi), of Turkmenistan.
Türkmenbaşy, formerly known as Krasnovodsk, Kyzyl-Su, and Shagadam, is a city in Balkan Province in Turkmenistan, on the Türkmenbaşy Gulf of the Caspian Sea. It sits at an elevation of 27 metres. The population was 86,800, mostly ethnic Turkmens but also Russian, Armenian and Azeri minorities. As the terminus of the Trans-Caspian Railway and site of a major seaport on the Caspian, it is an important transportation center. The city is also the site of Turkmenistan's largest oil refining complex.
Balkanabat, formerly Nebit-Dag and Neftedag, is the capital city of Balkan Province, the largest province in Turkmenistan. It lies at the foot of the Balkan Daglary mountain range. Balkanabat is about 450 km west of Ashgabat and 160 km east of the seaport city of Türkmenbaşy. The city layout is a grid of apartment blocks called kvartal (quarters). The main streets are Magtymguly, Pervomayskiy and Gurbansoltan eje şaýoly.
The Sarygamysh Lake, also Sarykamysh or Sary-Kamysh, is a lake in Central Asia. It is about midway between the Caspian Sea and the Aral Sea. It is the largest lake in Turkmenistan, in which three quarters of the entire lake's area is located. The Sarykamysh basin and the Sarykamysh delta of the Amu Darya river are physical and geographical nature regions of the Dashoguz Region of Turkmenistan.
The Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline is a proposed subsea pipeline between Türkmenbaşy in Turkmenistan, and Baku in Azerbaijan. According to some proposals it would also include a connection between the Tengiz Field in Kazakhstan, and Türkmenbaşy. The Trans-Caspian Gas Pipeline project would transport natural gas from Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan to European Union member countries, circumventing both Russia and Iran. It would do this by feeding the Southern Gas Corridor. This project attracts significant interest since it would connect vast Turkmen gas resources to major consumers Turkey and Europe.
The following outline is provided as an overview of and topical guide to Turkmenistan:
The Tyuleniy Archipelago, is an island group in the north-eastern Caspian Sea off the Mangyshlak Bay west of the Mangyshlak Peninsula and about 13 kilometres northwest of the Tupkaragan Peninsula, 27 kilometres north of Bautino. Perhaps the most substantial group of islands in the Caspian, they were first accurately mapped by Fedor Ivanovich Soimonov who led the 1719 Caspian Expedition, studying the Caspian Sea from 1719 to 1727.
Chechen Island is a coastal island on the western shore of the Caspian Sea. It is located 20 km east of Krainovka right off the headland on the northern tip of the Agrakhan Peninsula. This island belongs to the Republic of Dagestan, a federal subject of the Russian Federation.
The Caspian Sea is the world's largest inland body of water, often described as the world's largest lake or a full-fledged sea. An endorheic basin, it lies between Europe and Asia; east of the Caucasus, west of the broad steppe of Central Asia, south of the fertile plains of Southern Russia in Eastern Europe, and north of the mountainous Iranian Plateau of Western Asia. It covers a surface area of 371,000 km2 (143,000 sq mi), an area approximately equal to that of Japan, with a volume of 78,200 km3 (19,000 cu mi). It has a salinity of approximately 1.2%, about a third of the salinity of average seawater. It is bounded by Kazakhstan to the northeast, Russia to the northwest, Azerbaijan to the southwest, Iran to the south, and Turkmenistan to the southeast.
Bereket, formerly Gazanjyk or Kazandzhik, is a city in Balkan Province in western Turkmenistan. Bereket is the administrative centre of Bereket District.
Protected areas of Turkmenistan include nine nature reserves (zapovednik) and 13 sanctuaries (zakaznik) with a total area of 19,750 km2 or more than 4% of Turkmenistan's territory.
Hazar Nature Reserve is a nature reserve (zapovednik) of Turkmenistan.
The Cheleken Peninsula is a peninsula located in western Turkmenistan, in the eastern shores of the Caspian Sea.
The Ministry of Defense of Turkmenistan is a government agency under the Armed Forces of Turkmenistan which is the executive body in implementing defence policies in Turkmenistan. The current Minister of Defense is Major General Begenç Gündogdyýew. It was founded in January 1992 with the assistance of the Russian Armed Forces.
The Turkmen Naval Forces is the naval warfare branch of the armed forces of Turkmenistan. Turkmenistan's Navy Day is celebrated annually on October 9. The naval forces were directed by the Border Guard Service until 2009.
In the Soviet period, the Caspian Sea was practically an inland water basin within the Soviet Union's borders and washed off the coast of Iran only to the south. Until 1992, the status of the Caspian was regulated by the Soviet-Iranian treaties. After the collapse of the USSR, the emergence of the independent states of Azerbaijan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan raised the issue of dividing the Caspian Sea.
