Jennifer Lopez 'Lives It Up' With Turkmenistan Dictator Gurbanguly Berdymukamedov, Apologizes For it Later

Jennifer Lopez and her PR team are scrambling to save face following the pop star's performance for a Central Asian dictator last week. Lopez visited Turkmenistan to perform for President Gurbanguly Berdymukamedov, who was celebrating his 56th birthday.

"Had there been knowledge of human right issues of any kind, Jennifer would not have attended," said Mark Young, a spokesperson for Lopez.

Turkmenistan's issues with human rights violations aren't exactly hiding away however.

"Widely recognized as one of the most repressive in the world, the Turkmen government exercises total control of public life," reads a report from Human Rights Watch, a watchdog group working under the United Nations. Turkmenistan is "a country marked by extraordinary levels of repression."

A 2012 report indicated that Turkmenistan was the second most oppressive nation toward free press, behind only North Korea.

Young defended Lopez's ignorance of the situation, noting that she and other artists were hired to perform at a private corporate event, not a political one. The hosts? The China National Petroleum Corporation. A nationalized corporation representing China (itself with a great record on human rights) throwing a party for a dictator's birthday. Great photo opportunity for Lopez.

According to Young, the company requested that Lopez sing happy birthday at the last moment.

"This was not stipulated in her contract, but she graciously obliged the China National Petroleum Corporation request," Young said, noting that Lopez went out of her way to accommodate tyranny.

Lopez then performed "Happy Birthday, Mr. President." The event took place at a luxury resort, away from the 60 percent unemployment rates reported by the CIA Fact Book.

Lopez hasn't tweeted since the event, and the Turkmenistan account hasn't made a statement either. But the latter could be due to political strongarming.

#Turkmenistan blocks access to #gmail adding it to a very long list of banned/blocked websites.

— Turkmenistan (@Turkmenistan) February 21, 2012