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Uzbek president to visit Moscow

FEB. 15 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbek president Shavkat Mirziyoyev will make his first visit to Moscow as Uzbekistan’s leader in April, media reported quoting his press team. The trip is likely to include a meeting with Russian leader Vladimir Putin. Mr Putin met with Mr Mirziyoyev during the funeral of former president Islam Karimov in September. He backed Mr Mirziyoyev as president.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

Kazakh court detains editor

FEB. 13 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Almaty ordered Zhanolat Mamay, editor of the independent Tribuna newspaper, to spend two months in pre-trial detention as police investigate accusations that he helped launder money stolen by exiled Kazakh opposition leader and former chairman of the now defunct BTA Bank Mukhtar Ablyazov. Mr Mamay’s supporters have said he has been detained because of a crackdown by the authorities against the media.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

Uzbek authorities release banker from jail

FEB. 15 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — The authorities in Uzbekistan have released Rustam Usmanov, who once owned a bank and a string of other business, after 19 years in prison, RFE/RL reported. RFE/RL quoted a relative of Mr Usmanov as saying that he was released on Feb. 13. The move may be part of a general softening of tone in Uzbekistan after the death of Islam Karimov, ruler for 25 years, and the emergence of Shavkat Mirziyoyev, Mr Usmanov is credited with setting up Uzbekistan’s first bank in the early 1990s. The 69- year-old was convicted of fraud in 1998.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

IMF flies into Georgian capital

FEB. 15 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — An IMF delegation flew into Tbilisi for a two-week mission that could trigger a major injection of cash linked to economic changes. Georgia has been one of the most reform-minded countries in the former Soviet Union acting as something of a posterboy for IMF- backed changes. The government, though, is also looking for support to push through a tough economic downturn. GDP growth in 2016 was 2.2%, its lowest since 2009 when the economy shrank by 3.8% during the Global Financial Crisis.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

Georgian police arrest US man

FEB. 15 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Police in Georgia said that they had arrested a US citizen who is wanted in Uzbekistan on terrorism charges. They didn’t give any more details of the detained man except that they had started extradition proceedings. The man was arrested in the Black Sea town of Batumi. The countries of Central Asia and the South Caucasus are trying to dampen growing Islamic extremism activity in the region.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

Scrap metal hunters stealing dozens of man hole covers every day in Kazakh capital

ALMATY, FEB. 10 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Aset Issekshev, the mayor of Astana, said that dozens of manhole covers have been stolen to be melted-down and sold for scrap, causing major disruptions to the Kazakh capital’s infrastructure at it battles through another freezing winter.

Kazakh media quoted Mr Issekshev as saying that two areas of Astana had been cut off from the electricity grid and from heating after copper wire was stolen.

“Right now we are faced with the situation where between 10 and 15 cast iron covers are being stolen every day,” Kazakh media quoted him as saying to a group of entrepreneurs.

“Children are falling in them every day.”

He said the scrap metals hunters were selling the lumps of metal on Kazakhstan’s Black Market.

Astana is trying to put on its best face for EXPO-2017 which starts in June. Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev has been building up to the exposition for years as an opportunity to showcase the capital he built on the steppe.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

ABD chief heads to Uzbekistan

FEB. 15 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Takehiko Nakao, the president of the Asian Development Bank (ADB), will visit Uzbekistan later this month, the Trend news agency reported quoting the ADB’s Tashkent office, raising the possibility of a major cash injection for Uzbek business. Azernews reported that the ADB was lining up loans worth $2.1b for various sectors of Uzbekistan’s economy, including its power sector. Earlier this month the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) sent a high-profile delegation to Tashkent for talks with senior officials.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

US and Russian military chiefs meet in Azerbaijan

FEB. 15 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Baku scored a diplomatic coup by hosting the first meeting of the most senior military officers in the United States and Russia since 2014.

The meeting between General Joseph Dunford, US chairman of the Joint Chief of Staff, and General Valery Gerasimov, head of the Russian general staff, was scored through with extra importance as it was also the first high-level meeting between the two sides since Donald Trump became US President in January.

A statement from the Pentagon underlined its importance.

“The current sate of US-Russian military relations and the importance of consistent and clear military-to- military communication to prevent miscalculation and potential crisis (was on the agenda),” the Pentagon statement said.

Relations between the two sides have been strained over Russian military action in both Ukraine, where it is supporting pro-Moscow rebels, and in Syria, where it is supporting the forces of Syrian president Bashir Assad.

Before meeting Gen. Gerasimov, Gen. Dunford met with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev and the Azerbaijani defence minister Zakir Hasanov.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

Georgian police arrests priest accused of plotting assassination

TBILISI, FEB. 10 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Georgian police arrested Deacon Giorgi Mamaladze, a Georgian Orthodox priest, on suspicion of planning to assassinate a senior member of the Church, potentially even Patriarch Ilia II, shocking this deeply religious country.

Deacon Mamaladze was arrested at the Tbilisi National Airport after an informant said that he was travelling to Germany carrying cyanide. Patriarch Ilia is recuperating in Germany after an operation on his gall-bladder.

In a statement, Chief Prosecutor Irakli Shotadze said: “A citizen contacted the Prosecution Service of Georgia and stated that his/her acquaintance, Father Giorgi, had asked him/her for help in obtaining the life-threatening poisonous substance cyanide. As the person who submitted the statement had found out during the meeting, Father Giorgi was to murder a high-ranking clergyman using the aforementioned substance.”

Mr Shotadze, the prosecutor, did not name Ilia II but media immediately suspected that he was the target because of the Germany link.

Politicians have also fed the febrile air of conspiracies and counter conspiracies. PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili said security around Ilias II, Georgia’s figurehead and one of its most powerful people, was to be beefed-up.

“Given the extraordinary nature of this situation, I delegated my personal security detail to Berlin,” he said in an official statement. “We have averted a calamity, a treacherous attack on the Church, an act against our country, has been prevented.”

Father Mamaladze has denied the accusations.

There was also scepticism on the streets of Tbilisi. Tsiuri, a 24-year-old lawyer, said infighting was to blame.

“Although I do not trust Mamaladze, I am sure that this entire thing was staged. Two weeks ago some rumours spread about a possible assassination attempt against the Patriarch,” he said. “Our church is fractured and different groups are fighting for power. Somebody was trying to put Mr. Mamaladze offside by discrediting him.”

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)

Avalanche kills 7 Kazakh soldiers

FEB. 17 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — An avalanche killed seven Kazakh soldiers on a military exercise in mountains in the southwest of the country, media reported quoting the country’s emergency ministry. It also said that 16 more soldiers had been rescued from the avalanche.

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(News report from Issue No. 317, published on Feb.17 2017)