Residents of Turkmen town return home after blasts

ABADAN, Turkmenistan (Reuters) - Residents who fled powerful explosions in a Turkmenistan town were cautiously returning home on Friday, amid conflicting reports of what caused the mysterious blasts and how much damage they did.

The Foreign Ministry of the reclusive former Soviet republic, Central Asia's biggest natural gas producer, said hot weather had detonated fireworks at a storage facility in Abadan on Thursday but there had been no casualties.

Turkmenistan's exiled opposition said there were many dead and large-scale destruction after ammunition depots caught fire.

The blasts in Abadan at around 4 p.m. (1100 GMT) on Thursday could be heard in the capital Ashgabat 20 km (12 miles) away. Residents of Abadan said the barrage continued until midnight.

In Abadan, acrid smoke still veiled the town at dawn but gradually dispersed. Trucks with water tanks washed debris which included sharp metal fragments off the roads.

In one area of the leafy town of about 100,000 residents, houses and Soviet-era apartment blocks were shrouded in soot, with broken windows, smashed air conditioners and doors flung open by the blasts.

A power plant feeding electricity to Ashgabat had its windows smashed. Residents of the capital said there had been power cuts there.

"I have just returned and I could not recognise my flat," said Lena, 50, who sells greens at a bazaar. She had been evacuated to a nearby town and returned to find her home wrecked.

In Abadan, whose approaches were heavily patrolled by army and police, most locals were reluctant to speak about possible casualties.

"SHELLS IN STREETS"

"I am 70 and my eyes are weak, but I noticed that when people were running during the blasts, some of them were falling," said Oraz-aga, a pensioner. "I can't say anything about their condition."

The exiled opposition said on its website www.chrono-tm.org unexploded shells were still scattered in the streets. "Some of them are detonating, causing new deaths," it said. It posted a photograph showing a huge plume of smoke rising over the area.

The government released a statement saying the population was being given assistance, adding that President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov had chaired a meeting on the events on Thursday.

Berdymukhamedov, a professional dentist who holds virtually unlimited powers in his desert nation of 5.4 million people, was swiftly elected president after the sudden death of his predecessor Saparmurat Niyazov in December 2006.

Niyazov, who called himself Turkmenbashi the Great (Leader of the Turkmens), enjoyed a bizarre personality cult and stamped his image on almost every facet of life in the desert nation during his nearly 21-year rule.

Berdymukhamedov, who heads a one-party state which human rights groups say is one of the most authoritarian and repressive in the world, has sought to reduce Turkmen dependence on Russia by selling more gas to Iran and China.

Lionised by state propaganda, Berdymukhamedov has promised to bring the country out of isolation and has eased some of his predecessor's restrictions.

But critics say tentative economic reforms have not been matched by greater political freedom. Only Eritrea and North Korea scored worse in the 2010 press freedom index compiled by media watchdog Reporters Without Borders.

(Writing by Dmitry Solovyov; editing by Andrew Roche)