MAY 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — India’s state-owned ONGC Videsh said it had entered into a preliminary agreement with SOCAR Trading, the Geneva-based branch of Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company SOCAR, to jointly sell oil it produces in Azerbaijan. Since 2013, ONGC Videsh has owned a 2.7% stake in the Azeri Chirag-Guneshli offshore oil project in Azerbaijan.
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
MAY 31 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajikistan completed the construction of a power line that will link two Afghan villages to the Tajik grid, bringing electricity to around 3,000 Afghans for the first time. The US Embassy in Dushanbe and the Aga Khan Foundation jointly funded the $1.5m project. The power line will bring electricity from Tajikistan’s Gorno– Badakhshan Autonomous Oblast across the Panj river which marks the boundary with Afghanistan.
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
BISHKEK, MAY 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Melis Turganbayev, considered a major power broker in Kyrgyzstan, quit as interior minister saying that he needed a break.
The move, though, surprised observers who said that Mr Turganbayev may already be plotting a return to frontline politics, possibly at next year’s presidential election.
In an interview with the Kremlin- backed Sputnik news after his resignation, Mr Turganbayev said that there were no political reasons for his resignation and backed his nominated successor, Kashkar Junushaliev, previously the Bishkek police chief.
“He is an experienced officer and a good guy, who will continue my work on reforms in interior affairs,” he said.
Mr Turganbayev had been interior minister since October 2014.
Mars Sariyev, a political scientist in Bishkek, said President Atambayev may be manoeuvring his ministers to balance power and it may have suited him to remove Mr Turganbayev who had built up a large powerbase.
“I think that this step has been taken in favour of certain political groups ahead of the presidential elections,” he said.
The interior ministry is one of the most powerful institutions in Kyrgyzstan. It is essentially responsible for stability in the country and controls several of Kyrgyzstan’s armed forces.
On the streets of Bishkek, there was both pleasure at Mr Turganbayev’s resignation and apathy.
Sergei, 47, said that Mr Turganbayev’s resignation was of little consequence.“Unfortunately, new politicians here do not really bring any positive changes,” he said. “It does not really affect our lives.”
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
JUNE 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Kyrgyz government is under pressure to justify paying relatively high prices to Kazakhstan for electricity. Dastan Dzhumabekov, an MP in the ruling government coalition, asked Alibek Kaliyev, head of the National Energy Holding, to clarify why Kyrgyzstan accepted paying 9 tenge ($0.026) per kWh to Kazakhstan, while Kazakhstan charges Russia only 5 tenge ($0.014) per kWh. Mr Kaliyev was unable to give a clear answer which MPs said was illogical given Kyrgyzstan’s membership of the Eurasian Economic Union.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
MAY 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev said that the state was ready to buy the Aimroc mining company, which is alleged to be linked to his family. The company closed in 2014, as it ran into financial difficulties exploiting the Chovdar mine in western Azerbaijan. Aimroc’s name appeared in numerous investigations that linked its opaque offshore business to the presidential family. By presidential decree state-owned Azerigold will take over Aimroc.
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
JUNE 3 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — In 2016, Azerbaijan found itself in the midst of a crisis that it had tried to ignore for months. Low oil prices hit both revenues and investment opportunities for SOCAR, the state-owned energy company.
It is now trying to cut expenditures and raise cash through bonds and loans for its main projects. In Turkey, SOCAR’s subsidiary is divesting from a large petrochemical complex and readying for an IPO, in an effort to go full-steam into the Southern Gas Corridor business.
And Turkey is a key partner in the pipeline game, as it will become the gateway for Azerbaijani gas to Europe.
Now, though, SOCAR faces a problem. It can either diversify its portfolio, cut investments and wait for sunnier days or go ahead and pour cash — borrowed cash — into the US and Europe’s pet pipeline project.
Little does it matter that US President Barack Obama and British PM David Cameron both sent kind words to Azerbaijan’s international energy conference this week. SOCAR still has a problem.
But if it invests disproportionately into infrastructure, it might not have enough to ensure that production upstream is steady enough to fill the pipelines, which would be a repeat, though a much faster one, of the fate of the BTC oil pipeline, now constantly used below capacity.
The incessant movements, even marginal, in foreign markets in the past few months reveal how shaky SOCAR’s position is. Last week it closed representative offices in three countries to save money. But that won’t be enough to pay back the gamble it has taken with all the outstanding loans and bonds to build the West’s dream pipeline.
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
ALMATY, MAY 31 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Roughly two dozen people protested in front of the US consulate in Almaty against what they said was the influence of foreign governments in demonstrations across Kazakhstan since April.
Most of the people at the protest were the same protagonists who had staged demonstrations against banks earlier in the year. The impression was that a group with close links to the authorities had organised the protest to show support for the government. And in contrast to anti- government protests on May 21, police didn’t intervene.
Zhanna Sadykova, a leader of the so-called Give People Housing movement, said one of the demonstrators’ targets were protests against the Kazakh government in the US last week.
“Those who protested in US cities are not citizens of our country and therefore have no right to interfere with our internal policies,” she said.
The protests that have swept Kazakhstan since April have been unprecedented. What started as an isolated protest against land reforms has morphed into a general gripe against the government and the country’s stagnating economy.
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
MAY 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Car manufacturer GM Uzbekistan will produce a new model of Chevrolet Aveo cars for both the domestic market and exports to Russia, state-owned Uzavtoprom said. GM Uzbekistan, 75% owned by Uzavtoprom and 25% owned by US- based GM, said production of the new model will cost around $100m and its Uzbek plant will manufacture 73,600 cars/year. GM Uzbekistan is an important part of the Uzbek economy as it is one of its biggest JVs outside oil and gas.
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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
JUNE 3 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Perhaps with the Council of Europe’s criticism in mind, Georgia’s President Giorgi Margvelashvili sent a bill that would have weakened the Constitu- tional Court’s ability to temper the government back to Parliament.
Mr Margvelashvili has shown both courage and wisdom by sending this bill back. It was political meddling at its worst by the Georgian Dream coalition which had wanted to extend its control over the Constitutional Court, an independent body that is supposed to safeguard the country’s governing principles.
His action also gives another insight into the Georgian Dream coalition, only a few months before what is likely to be a hotly contested parliamentary election. PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili said both that he did not agree with the veto, but also that the Georgian Dream coalition MPs would not exercise their right to override the presidential decision in parliament.
The Georgian Dream coalition is internally divided and the President and the PM disagree on fundamental issues. The governing coalition looks to be in a weak state in the run up to the election.
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(Editorial from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
DUSHANBE, JUNE 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Tajik authorities finally snuffed out the country’s only genuine opposition party, the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan (IRPT), after a court sentenced its top leaders to life in prison for plotting a coup last year.
It’s been a long-winded and very public end for the IRPT which had once laid claim to be an alternative to President Emomali Rakhmon and the Tajik elite.
Eight months after they were arrested, the Tajik Supreme Court imprisoned Saidumar Khusayni and Makhmadali Khait, two deputy leaders of the IRPT, for life for plotting a coup. Another dozen senior IRPT officials received sentences of between 14 and 28 years, including Khikmatullo Sayfullozoda, the editor of the now banned IRPT newspaper.
Zarafo Rakhmoni, the IRPT lawyer, was the only woman sent to prison. She received a two year jail sentence.
A Dushanbe-based analyst, who asked to remain anonymous, told the Conway Bulletin correspondent in Dushanbe that the verdicts were deliberately harsh and designed to send a strong message to other potential dissenters.
“Even those who are ideologically against the IRPT, were not happy with the verdict, because the verdict was fully politically motivated and lacked transparency,” he said.
“The authorities did not care if society or the international community think the verdict is harsh, inhuman, and falsified. It was a very open move to punish the main opposition figures, as well as to show who is the boss in the county.”
The IRPT’s leader, Mukhiddin Kabiri, fled into exile earlier last year. Several pro-government demonstrations were staged this year outside European embassies to try to pressure them to extradite Mr Kabiri.
And Mr Kabiri had a warning for the Tajik authorities. In an interview with Reuters before the verdict was announced he said the charges were trumped up and that banning the party would create more problems.
“What is happening in the country will play into the hands of radicals and more and more youths, having lost all trust in the government, will join the ranks of extremist groups,” he said.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)
