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Violence towards Kazakh TV star sparks debate on violence against women

ALMATY, JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bayan Yessentayeva, a high profile TV celebrity and a role- model for thousands of Kazakh women, was beaten unconscious by her husband during a row at a petrol station, sparking a rare public debate about domestic violence in Kazakhstan.

Eyewitnesses said that Bakhytbek Yessentayev was drunk when he stabbed, punched and kicked Ms Yessentayeva, 42. Mr Yessentayev has a reputation for violence. Earlier this year, a video was posted on Youtube which allegedly showed him punch- ing staff at a casino after he lost thousands of dollars in one evening.

A spokesman for the Talgar hospital near Almaty said that Ms Yessentayeva was unconscious but in a stable condition.

“She’s a very strong woman to be able to survive, especially with such injuries. She has a strong spirit,” said Erbol Sarsenbayev, deputy director of the hospital.

For Kazakhs the beating has generated a rare, and uncomfortable, debate about domestic abuse.

According to the United Nations, 500 women are killed each year by their husbands or boyfriends in Kazakhstan, one of the highest rates per capita in the world.

Campaigners have said that in Kazakhstan a mix of heavy drinking, a distrust of the authorities and Islamic practices which can subjugate women in the home combine to create conditions which heighten scenarios where domestic abuse can occur.

The beating of Ms Yessentayeva, though, triggered a rare protest against domestic violence with women posting photos of their faces on Twitter with painted-on bruises.

Zulfiya Baisakova, chairperson of the activist group Union of Crisis Centers in Kazakhstan, said they receive between 15,000 to 20,000 reports of domestic violence each year.

“Official statistics show that everything is improving but unofficially statistics show an increase in the number of incidences,” she said.

And women in Kazakhstan are frustrated by the lack of attention that domestic abuse receives.

Diana Burkit, a student from south Kazakhstan, told the Conway Bulletin that although she was not a victim of abuse her relatives had been.

“I resent that only after Yessentayeva was abused has anybody paid attention to this. How about what goes on in Shymkent?” she said.

She described domestic violence in southern Kazakhstan as rampant.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Railway construction delayed, says Azerbaijan Railways chief

JUNE 13 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan Railways chief Javid Gurbanov said that the construction of the Baku-Tbilisi-Kars railway connection has been delayed by adverse weather conditions, but is on track to be completed by the end of the year. Georgia has already completed the section that will cross its territory. The Turkish government also confirmed that it plans to complete its section by the end of 2016. The original timeline of the project, started in 2007,scheduled its completion for 2010.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

WB approves Kazakhstan road loan

JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The World Bank approved a $978m loan to finance the construction of a road link across Kazakhstan, which will complete the transit corridor between Astana and the west of the country. The project will cost a total of $1b and will be partly funded by the government. The World Bank is also funding part of the Kazakh section of the Western Europe – Western China highway.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Editorial: Azeri sport sponsorship

JUNE 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) -Viewers watching the UEFA European football championships in France will have noticed, it’s impossible not to, SOCAR sponsorship rolling across the advertising hoarding on the side of the pitch.

Even in a recession, SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company, finds the cash to sponsor a major sporting event. This weekend, too, Baku hosts its inaugural Formula 1 Grand Prix. Last summer the city hosted the first European Games.

The total bill for these lavish affairs is likely to run to the billions of dollars. Of course the advertising has raised Azerbaijan’s profile but to what end? SOCAR doesn’t need to become a household name in Europe; athletics and motorsport are hardly integral to the Azerbaijani national character.

Most of these sporting deals would have been organised before the collapse in oil prices that has pressured Azerbaijan’s economy, tipped it into recession and squeezed jobs. Ordinary Azerbaijanis are not having a good time, as shown by nationwide protests earlier this year. Signs of resentment are being more easily picked up.

ENDS

(Editorial from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

EEU plans single electricity market, say energy ministers after meeting in Tajikistan

JUNE 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Eurasian Economic Union, a trade bloc led by Russia but also involving Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia plans to set up a unified electricity market by 2019, EEU members’ energy ministers said after a meeting in Dushanbe. Tajikistan aspires to be part of the EEU, which critics have said is a Kremlin project to extend its control.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Uzbekistan closes borders for SCO summit

JUNE 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Uzbek government ordered the closure of land borders for ten days to try to insulate the country from potential Islamic militant attacks ahead of a meeting of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) heads of states, scheduled for next week.

Leaders from Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan will join Uzbek President Islam Karimov at the annual SCO summit in Tashkent on June 23/24.

Uzbekistan has emphasised its efforts in combating terrorism, one of the pillars of the SCO, and wants to demonstrate its ability to become a safe haven of peace in Central Asia.

Analysts said that closing its border crossing checkpoints is a way of demonstrating control over its territory and its capacity to fence off potential terrorists from abroad.

The authorities dismissed earlier rumours that Tashkent would be closed off during the summit.

“There will be enhanced security checks, but the city will operate in normal mode,” the Uzbek ministry of interior said in a statement.

In the weeks leading up to the summit, the Tashkent city administration ordered a clean-up of the capital. Reports said that hundreds of satellite dishes were removed from houses on Prospekt Kosmonavtov,a main road in Tashkent which runs down to Mr Karimov’s official residence.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Remittances drop in Georgia

JUNE 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s Central Bank said remittances from abroad fell by 5% in May to $92.9m, compared to May 2015, a sign that the regional economic malaise is still biting economies in the South Caucasus and Central Asia. Money transfers from Russia represented one-third of all remittances last month. Remittance flows to Georgia have also been badly hit by Greece’s economic problems. Greece, also a predominately Orthodox country, had been the second highest originator of remittances to Georgia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Azerbaijan to launch ferrosilicon plant

JUNE 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s state-owned Baku Non-Ferrous Metals & Ferroalloys Company said it will launch in 2017 a new plant for the production of ferrosilicon and ferrosilicon manganese, two ferroalloys used in the heavy industry. The plant will be located at the Sumgayit Chemical Industrial Park outside of Baku.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

International Bank of Azerbaijan issues loan to Iran

JUNE 12 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – International Bank of Azerbaijan, the country’s largest lender, will issue a $500m loan to Iran for the construction of the Rasht-Astara railway section, part of a rail link from Qazvin to Astara, around the southern shore of the Caspian Sea. The total cost of the Rasht-Astara segment is projected to be $1.1b. The countries of the South Caucasus have been quick to engage Iran in business since sanctions were lifted earlier this year.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Kyrgyzstan accuses Centerra of corruption at Kumtor

BISHKEK, JUNE 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev instructed state prosecutors to investigate agreements signed by Canadian miner Centerra Gold in 2003-04, after corruption charges emerged against both Centerra and former officials at the state-owned Kyrgyzaltyn.

Earlier this week, the country’s security service said that Dastan Sarygulov, the 69-year-old former head of Kyrgyzaltyn from 1992 to 1999, had been charged with plotting a coup earlier this year and taking bribes in the 1990s.

The charges appear to be based on accusations made last week by Len Homeniuk, former head of Centerra and Kumtor Gold, who sent a letter to Kyrgyz prosecutors alleging corrupt practices that had involved the miner over its entire lifetime, explicitly naming Mr Sarygulov.

In the letter, Mr Homeniuk said that the companies he headed were regularly asked for bribes by Kyrgyzaltyn, which owns a 32% stake in Centerra.

“[Their requests] were sometimes very significant, more than $200,000 in a given month,” Mr Homeniuk wrote. “Dustan Sarygulov and Kamchybek Kudaibergenov always explained such requests that they were under pressure by the office of the President.”

Centerra, Kumtor Gold and Kyrgyzaltyn have not commented on the allegations.

The revelations seem to be well- timed for Kyrgyzstan.

Sarygulov was already under house arrest, accused of having participated in the coup plot.

Now, analysts say, the Homeniuk letter could be a powerful tool for Mr Atambayev to both discredit his predecessors and taint Centerra’s record in Kyrgyzstan, just as it prepares an arbitration case in Stockholm against the government for blocking its business development.

“Timing is important. Homeniuk’s revelations seem a gift to Mr Atambayev now,” Mars Sariyev of the Institute of Public Policy, a Bishkek-based think tank, told The Bulletin.

Centerra owns the Kumtor Gold Company, which operates the country’s largest gold mine, which accounts for around 7% of Kyrgyzstan’s GDP.

In March security forces raided the office of Kumtor in Bishkek looking for evidence of financial wrongdoing. Centerra has said that Kyrgyzstan is using heavy-handed tactics to try and claim more direct ownership of Kumtor.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)