Category Archives: Central Asia & South Caucasus News

Stock market: Roxi Petroleum

NOV. 4 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — On a mild slide since mid-August, Roxi Petroleum’s stock price received a bump after the company published encouraging results for its new oil wells on Oct. 28.

The London-based company, which operates the BNG Contract Area in western Kazakhstan near Tengiz, said it has almost completed the initial drilling operations at its new Deep Well 6.

The news, technical in nature, was accompanied by a high volume of trading on the stock market, sending Roxi to 10.5p, a 9% jump on the day of the announcement.

The company now needs to assess the commercial feasibility of the field at different depths. Clive Carver, the company’s chairman, said that the preliminary results at Deep Well 6 were even more encouraging than Roxi’s previously drilled deep wells.

A trio of high-ranking Kazakhs owns Roxi.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Armenian President to see out term

NOV. 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armen Gevorgyan, chief of the presidential staff in Armenia, said that, despite the country’s prospective transition from a presidential to a parliamentary democracy, President Serzh Sargsyan will continue to rule until his term, his second and final one, ends in 2018. Last December, a referendum approved the switch in the country’s form of government. Next year, Armenians will vote in parliamentary elections with a new electoral law. In the Central Asia/South Caucasus region, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan have switched to parliamentary systems of government.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Kazakhstan’s Air Astana expands

NOV. 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s flagship carrier Air Astana said it plans to buy 13 new aircrafts due to growing demand. Air Astana will make an offer to buy 11 Airbus and two Boeing planes over the next four years. British BAE Systems owns 49% of Air Astana, while Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund Samruk-Kazyna owns the rest.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Inflation rises in Kazakhstan

NOV. 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Statistics Committee said inflation had risen by 0.6% in October, pushing up prices that had stabilised in previous months. Since the beginning of the year, prices have risen an average of 6.2%. The Central Bank has said that it wants to contain inflation between 6% and 8%. Last year, inflation in Kazakhstan reached double digits.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Netanyahu visits Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan

OCT. 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Israeli PM Benjamin Netanyahu will visit Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan over the next three months, the Israeli government said. Mr Netanyahu has visited Azerbaijan previously during a term as PM in 1997. No Israeli PM has ever visited Kazakhstan. Both Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan are Israel’s biggest oil suppliers.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan patch up border disputes

BISHKEK, OCT. 31 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Delegations from Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan met to agree solutions to 49 long-running border disputes around the Ferghana Valley which, earlier this year, had threatened to tip into conflict.

The agreements mark the next stage in an unprecedented and surprising detente between the two rivals since Uzbek PM Shavkat Mirizyoyev was appointed acting president after the death of Islam Karimov in September.

This was the second of two meetings between the Uzbek and Kyrgyz deputy PMs. A third meeting is scheduled before the end of the year.

Bishkek-based analyst Elmira Nogoybaeva said the change in attitude in Tashkent was welcome but that Kyrgyzstan would need to see whether this was a genuine change of heart or a temporary fad.

“Such meetings are always welcomed by Kyrgyzstan, the question is how long will they last,” she said. “We all look to these meetings with optimism.”

The Ferghana Valley lies at the heart of Central Asia and analysts have previously said that if tension between Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan over borders boils over into conflict, and this year there have been reports of Kyrgyz and Uzbek soldiers squaring up to each other, it will pull the whole region into war.

In Bishkek, people were optimistic. Ainagul, 43, said it was a positive but there would be problems ahead.

“Of course, it is good that borders are being delineated, now Kyrgyz people will know to whom territory belongs, and it will prevent conflict between Kyrgyz and Uzbek,” she said. “I still doubt though that conflicts on borders will stop altogether as we still have problems even on the Kyrgyz- Kazakh border which was supposed to have been delineated.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Insulting Tajik President becomes a crime

NOV. 3 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon signed into law a motion passed by parliament at the end of last year that insulting the president would become a criminal office, media reported. The new law underlines the increasingly autocratic nature of the regime that Mr Rakhmon has built up in Tajikistan. Last month, MPs also decreed that he should be given the title of Founder of the Nation.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Chinese PM visits Kyrgyz capital

NOV. 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Chinese PM Li Keqiang visited Bishkek for a ministerial meeting of Shanghai Cooperation Organisation members, a first step in an 8-day tour of Central Asia and Eastern Europe. Mr Li will also visit Kazakhstan, his second visit this year, before flying to Latvia and Russia. During his visit to Kyrgyzstan, Mr Li also said that he hopes that the investigation into a car bomb at the Chinese embassy in August can soon be concluded.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Azerbaijan exports oil to Belarus

NOV. 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan sent 84,700 tonnes of oil to Belarus, the country’s first commercial energy exports to Belarus since short-lived swaps in 2010/11. Belneftekhim, the Belarusian buyer, will use Azerbaijani crude at its Mozyr refinery. Belarus is actively seeking alternative suppliers of oil as Russian shipments have failed to meet domestic demand. Azerbaijan’s oil was sent through Georgia’s Supsa port to Odessa in Ukraine and then on to Belarus.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)

Kyrgyzstan patches together new government coalition

BISHKEK, NOV. 3 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyzstan formed a new coalition government built around the Social Democratic Party, the party of President Almazbek Atmabayev, which kept Sooronbai Jeenbekov as PM.

The relative speed that parliament was able to patch together a government coalition will cheer investors and businesses who were worried about a prolonged period of instability. The previous government fell apart only 10 days ago over rows about an impending referendum.

Retaining Mr Jeenbekov, PM since May, will also boost confidence in Kyrgyzstan’s ability to withstand political stresses.

The new government coalition includes the Bir Bol and Kyrgyzstan parties, two minor parties. The coalition, though, only has a thin parliamentary majority with 68 seats in the 120-seat chamber.

A row over a referendum planned for Dec. 11 split the previous coalition government. The referendum focuses on giving more power to the PM, a shift that opponents of President Atambayev have said has been engineered to allow him to take the empowered PM job once he leaves the presidency next year. He has denied that he has such plans.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 303, published on Nov. 4 2016)