JULY 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company SOCAR posted a loss of 1.8b manat ($1.2b) in 2015 because of low oil prices, its first loss for over a decade. SOCAR said it will potentially turn a profit this year because of a sharp depreciation of the manat in December 2015, when the Central Bank ditched the peg to the US-dollar.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 288, published on July 8 2016)
JULY 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev released a music video in which he sings a melancholic ballad. Mr Atambayev also wrote the Russian-language song, entitled ‘In spite of fate’. Mr Atambayev does not appear in the video which features scenes from a Soviet-era movie. Five days later, Mr Atambayev released a second music video.
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(News report from Issue No. 288, published on July 8 2016)
JUNE 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The total cost of the new pipelines that will form the so-called Southern Gas Corridor amounts to $6.1b, according to Vagif Aliyev, head of investment at SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company. TANAP, which will run through Turkey, will cost $4.9b, out of which Azerbaijani companies will contribute $820m, according to Mr Aliyev. The Trans-Adriatic Pipeline (TAP), which will connect Turkey to Italy, has a price tag of $1.2b, and will be completed in the next three years.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
JUNE 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kylychbek Arpachiev, the former head of the investigations department at the Kyrgyz Prosecutor-General’s office, was jailed for 14 years for corruption and extortion. Arpachiev was arrested in 2015 for trying to extort $100,000. His imprisonment highlights the issue of corrupt officials in Kyrgyzstan.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
JUNE 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Iran and Turkmenistan have agreed a barter deal which significantly boosts their cooperation, media reported. According to Iranian media reports, Turkmenistan will export around $30b worth of gas to north Iran over the next 10 years in exchange for $30b of technical assistance. The two neighbours have been developing their cooperation over the past few years, often through barter agreements.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
DUSHANBE, JUNE 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The sharp economic downturn that dragged Tojiksodirotbank into administration earlier this year is circling another potential Tajik banking victim.
People lining up to use Agroinvestbank ATMs in the capital Dushanbe complained of a shortage of cash and worried that it too was going to be placed under the Central Bank’s administration. A company spokesperson denied this.
Ozod, a 42-years-old driver, said he had checked several ATMs across the city to try to find some cash.
“None of them had money,” he said. “I called the bank and they told me to check this one, as they said they had put some money in it. Now, I am waiting here and I hope I can withdraw some money to buy groceries before the Ramadan holiday.”
Nigora, a 34-year-old employee of one of Dushanbe’s many international NGOs, said that she had lost trust in Tajik banks.
“We had Tojiksodirotbank and now this,” she said. “I want to change my bank but I don’t know which one I should choose because I don’t trust the banks anymore.”
In May, Tojiksodirotbank said it had run out of cash and asked the Central Bank to put it under its administration. It also started talks to sell a stake to the EBRD. Last year the IMF said a drop in the value of the somoni and a fall in remittances being sent from Russia had undermined the economy and threatened the banking sector’s liquidity.
An Agroinvestbank employee denied rumours the bank was facing bankruptcy. Instead she said that a religious holiday was pressuring the bank’s resources. “People need more money ahead of Ramadan and that’s why cash is drying up,” she said.
The Conway Bulletin’s Tajikistan correspondent toured Agroinvestbank ATMs in Dushanbe. Most were empty, some were able to give up to $25 and others ran out of cash midway through delivering it.
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(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
JUNE 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Italian authorities accused Luca Volontè, a former MP in Italy’s parliament and also in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE), of taking a €2.3m ($2.6m) bribe in 2012-14 to vote down a resolution to condemn Azerbaijan for mistreating political prisoners.
This is an important case for Azerbaijan as, if proved, the allegations will once again highlight a culture of corruption in Azerbaijan.
Mr Volontè’s lawyers denied the allegations of bribery and money laundering.
The motion to condemn Azerbaijan’s treatment of 85 prisoners, described as political prisoners, was voted down in Jan. 2013 by PACE representatives 128 to 79.
Now Italian prosecutors said Mr Volontè, who organised the voting down of the motion, took €2.3m from Azerbaijani companies linked to the government. The prosecutors’ investigation said Baktelekom, a Baku-based telecoms company, made 18 payments between 2012 and 2014 to companies linked to Mr Volontè through a number of different banks.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
JUNE 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s justice minister, Tea Tsulukiani, reiterated that former president Mikheil Saakashvili would be arrested if he travelled to Georgia to campaign in a parliamentary election set for October. The Georgian government has put out arrest warrants for Mr Saakashvili connected to various financial crimes when he was in power between 2004 and 2013. Mr Saakashvili is currently governor of the Odessa region in Ukraine. He has said that he would like to return to Georgia ahead of the election.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
JUNE 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – A major mudslide has blocked one of the most important trade routes between Georgia and Russia for more than a week, media reported. The mudslide on June 23 at the Upper Lars checkpoint is especially important for Armenia. It is the only major route linking Russia and Armenia. Armenia is largely reliant on goods being imported in from Russia. It has decent relations with Iran to the south but poor relations with neighbours Azerbaijan and Turkey.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
BISHKEK, JUNE 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Turkish security forces said that two of the three attackers at Istanbul’s international airport on Tuesday were from Central Asia, highlighting Islamic extremist recruitment in the region.
At least 44 people died and another 240 people were injured when the three attackers opened fire with machine guns outside the terminal building and then blew themselves up. Nobody has claimed responsibility, although the radical IS group is the main suspect.
The Turkish government has now said one of the attackers was from the North Caucasus and the others were from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan. Uzbekistan has not commented; Kyrgyzstan initially denied a connection.
But analysts said that if two of the attackers were proved to be from Central Asia, it would show the increasingly effective recruitment network IS has developed in the region.
Anna Matveeva of King’s College London said Central Asia had become one of IS’s main recruitment pools because of its various social problems and the marginalisation of pious Muslims.
“Radicalisation and violence is definitely on the rise in Central Asia,” she said. “I think this phenomenon is growing.”
Central Asian governments are worried about the rise in IS recruitment in the area.
In 2015, a senior Tajik police commander defected to IS. Last month, the Kazakh government blamed an attack in Aktobe, in the northwest of the country, on a group which had links with Syria.
Analysts have said part of the problem is that security forces in Central Asia don’t coordinate effectively.
Kate Mallinson, a Central Asia analyst at London-based GPW, said if proved that two of the Istanbul attackers were from Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan there was likely to be a reaction by the security forces.
“The tragic attack in Istanbul will give the Central Asian governments further carte blanche in their application of punitive measures against Islamic movements in the Central Asian region,” she said.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 287, published on July 1 2016)
