MARCH 5 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenia officially began campaigning for a parliamentary election set for April 2. There are five political parties and four blocs competing in the election which is being held under new rules. It is also the first parliamentary election held under a new constitution that shifts some power from the president to the parliament.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
MARCH 9 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Prosecutors in Kyrgyzstan accused two media outlets, Radio Free Europe’s Kyrgyz service and zanoza.kg, of defaming President Almazbek Atambayev and threatened to sue them, worrying free speech campaigners. These free speech campaigners said that this was more evidence that free speech in Kyrgyzstan was worsening after a leak at the start of the year showed security forces were tracking people who criticise the president on the internet.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
TBILISI, MARCH 5 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Austria’s foreign minister Sebastian Kurz shocked the Georgian government by suggesting in an interview with the German magazine Bild that refugee centres could be set up in Georgia.
The Austrian government later played down the statement as purely hypothetical but not before it had caused consternation in Georgia.
Georgia’s foreign ministry released a statement which said that it was not possible for the country to take in refugees.
“The issue is not on the agenda of Georgia as the implementation of this project is impossible due to the challenges currently facing the country,” the statement said.
Mr Kurz has become popular in Austria for his hardline stance over the hundreds of thousands of refugees who have travelled to Europe from Syria and elsewhere since 2015.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
ALMATY, MARCH 5 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s parliament officially approved changes to the country’s constitution, changes President Nursultan Nazarbayev lauded as yet another step forward for Kazakh democracy but his opponents dismissed as tinkering necessary to impose a succession plan.
Unusually for Central Asia and the South Caucasus, Mr Nazarbayev didn’t opt to have his constitutional amendments approved by the populous through a referendum, as he has previously done. Instead, he presented them as minor changes to government that didn’t need to bother ordinary people.
“The government will strengthen its independence and responsibility for their decisions. Parliament will have new powers to control the activities of the Government and the executive bodies,” Mr Nazarbayev said in a statement on his website released after signing the changes into law. “The political system will gain a greater degree of democracy and stability. However, the basic foundation of the Republic of Kazakhstan is a presidential form of government.”
Analysts though have said that the changes are actually fairly substantial. The cabinet will report to parliament as well as to the president, it will also have greater influence over the hiring and firing of ministers and its executive will have more independence.
The division of responsibilities will also allow Mr Nazarbayev to concentrate on issues he is more comfortable with, such as foreign policy and security, rather than more troublesome issues such as education, health and social welfare.
Some observers said that behind these moves lay a strategy aimed at diluting power away from the presidency so that power can effectively be split with succession, rather than concentrating power in the hands of one person.
Mr Nazarbayev is 76-years-old and has ruled Kazakhstan since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 but has yet to lay out a coherent succession strategy.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
MARCH 7 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — The IFC, part of the World Bank, is developing a programme to help cotton growers in Uzbekistan produce better cotton, more efficiently and without forced labour, an industry website reported. Cotton is one of Uzbekistan’s key currency earners but its reputation has been dented over the past few years because of the use of child labour to pick cotton. Many Western brands have boycotted it. The IFC is trialling its programme across 12 farms. If it is successful, it will roll it out to 3,000.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
MARCH 6 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — In a major blow to Turkmenistan’s ambitions to cements itself as the region’s top gas exporter, Uzbekistan and China cancelled planned work on a fourth pipeline that was to pump gas to Chinese consumers.
The so-called Line D was quietly dropped at the beginning of the month, media reported quoting a RIA-Novosti article. In the article, RIA-Novosti quoted unnamed officials as saying a drop in demand for gas in China meant that there was no need to build an expensive fourth pipeline from Turkmenistan.
A JV between China’s CNPC and Uzbekneftegas had been created in 2014 to build the 200km section of the pipeline through Uzbekistan. Work had been due to start in H1 2016 but had been pushed back.
For Turkmenistan, the cancelling of Line D, which hasn’t been officially confirmed by Ashgabat or Beijing, is bad news. It’s economy is reliant on gas exports, and with prices low, it is floundering.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
MARCH 8 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Opponents of US President Donald Trump verged on accusing him of corruption after they linked him to a hotel in Baku connected to Azerbaijani officials accused of taking bribes and of having links to the Iranian Revolutionary Guard.
A report by the New Yorker said the Trump International Hotel and Tower Baku was linked to Azerbaijan’s former transport minister Ziya Mammadov who has been linked to a business partner who does business with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard.
Some sanctions on dealing with Iran have been lifted but for US citizens it is still illegal to deal with Iran’s Revolutionary Guard, directly or indirectly
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
MARCH 6 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s ministry of education refuted a statement from Turkey which said that 33 Kazakh-Turkish schools linked to the Gulen Movement would be transferred to Turkish control. Turkey blames the Gulen Movement for a coup attempt last year and has looked to close all institutions linked to it, including a series of schools across Central Asia. Both Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan have said that they will not close the Gulen schools. Last year, Kazakhstan rebranded the Gulen-linked schools as “Bilim Innovative Lyceums”. Bilim means education in Kazakh.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
TBILISI, MARCH 7 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Official data from Georgia showed that its wine producers exported 8.8m bottles of wine in January and February, nearly double the volume during the same period in 2016.
Wine is one of Georgia’s most important exports and the National Wine Agency said that the value of exports in January and February hit $20.5m. This puts Georgia on course for a record year and highlights the success of its export strategy. So successful has the marketing strategy become that rival winemaker Azerbaijan has pledged to mimic it.
Georgia’s wine industry has concentrated its efforts on breaking into new markets where drinkers are acquiring a taste for wine. Top of this list is China. Georgia sold nearly 832,000 bottles of wine to China in Jan. – Feb. and expects the Chinese market to become the second biggest, after Russia, by the end of the year, overtaking Ukraine.
The head of marketing at the Wine Agency, Irakli Cholobargia, said: “China as a market is one of the keys to drive volumes and serve as one of the alternatives to the Russian market on which we would like to be less dependent as far as unstable political relations are concerned.”
The boost in wine exports to China also vindicates advocates of a free-trade deal signed with China in Sept. 2016. Since then Georgian wine companies have signed a series of deals with Chinese companies, including a deal by Badagoni in Nov. 2016 to export 5m bottles of wine.
In 2016, Georgia’s overall exports rose by 38% to 50m bottles. Russia made up 27.2m of this total, Ukraine 8.8m and China 8.3m.
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(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
MARCH 5 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — The authorities in Abkhazia, one of Georgia’s rebel states, closed two of the three remaining crossing points, drawing criticism from the United States and the EU. Abkhazian officials decided last year to close the border points to improve control over border crossings. Abkhazia also closed two other border crossings in 2016.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 320, published on March 13 2017)
