Category Archives: Uncategorised

Rakhmon tightens grip over Tajikistan

DUSHANBE, MAY 22 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon can now rule over Tajikistan for his entire life after people voted in a referendum to scrap limits on presidential terms.

The referendum also lowered the age that a person can run for president to 30 from 35, potentially allowing Mr Rakhmon’s son to run for office in 2020 if he was needed, and also banned political parties linked to a religion. The main opposition party in Tajikistan had been the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan until it was outlawed last year and its leaders chased into exile or arrested.

At its core, the referendum gives Mr Rakhmon almost total control over Tajikistan.

Officially, the Central Elections Committee said that turnout was 92% and that 96.6% of people had voted for the changes.

But while, at least openly, few people in Tajikistan are prepared to express any dissatisfaction with Mr Rakhmon, some were critical of the referendum.

Malika, a 52-year-old teacher, said people had voted for the changes because they think that Mr Rakhmon is a guarantor of peace and stability.

“It’s simple and depressing. People do not want war and accept whatever the government does. We all saw how our people died,” she said referring to a civil war in the mid-1990s. “We just want stability and do not care who runs the country and for how long.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Turkmenistan to import S Korean buses

MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Turkmenistan will import South Korea-made passenger buses, in an effort to boost economic cooperation. President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov and Kim Wee- Chul, CEO Hyundai Engineering, signed the agreement in Ashgabat. In 2013, Hyundai Engineering had completed construction work at a processing plant near Galkynysh, the largest gas field in the country.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Kazakh electricity company eyes up CASA-1000

MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — KEGOC, a state-owned electricity distributor in Kazakhstan, said it would be open to exporting electricity to Afghanistan and Pakistan through the CASA-1000 line. The CASA-1000 project is scheduled for completion by 2020.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Kyrgyzstan to transfer Chinese factories

MAY 22 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyzstan’s foreign minister Yerlan Abdyldayev said he is negotiating the transfer of several Chinese factories to the Central Asian country over the next few years. Mr Abyldayev sees this development as a potential boost for Kyrgyzstan’s industrialisation. Kyrgyzstan’s economy is heavily reliant on remittances from abroad, which have shrunk in the past 18 months due to a recession in Russia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Editorial: Georgia’s election

MAY 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Fighting broke out outside a polling station in rural Georgia this week as people prepared to vote in local government by-elections. The fighting was direct and brutal and was also captured by onlookers on their mobile phones.

Videos from the fighting give a clear insight into the vicious divide in Georgian society between those people supporting the Georgian Dream Coalition, bankrolled by billionaire Bidzina Ivanishvili, and those supporting the United National Movement, the party of former president Mikheil Saakashvili.

Just as Mr Ivanishvili and Mr Saakashvili hate each other, so do supporters of either party. If the parliamentary election of 2012 was considered nasty, it’ll be nothing compared to this year’s issue.

And it is expected to be close. Opinion polls haven’t been able to give any side a clear advantage. They have also introduced the possibility of third party muscling in on the two main rivals.

Expect a bumpy, passionate ride through to October.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Azerbaijan’s oil company cuts costs

MAY 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil company SOCAR said it had closed three of its representative offices abroad, in an attempt to cut costs during a period of sustained low oil prices. Rovnag Abdullayev, SOCAR’s CEO said the company shut offices in Switzerland, Belgium and Germany. Importantly, these are just the representative offices, the offices of SOCAR’s subsidiaries will remain open. SOCAR is one of Azerbaijan’s biggest brands. For it to close offices means that the government is feeling the pinch economically.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Azerbaijan’s oil company to build new refinery

MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil company, said it will build a new oil refinery in Kulevi, on Georgia’s Black Sea coast, near its existing oil terminal. SOCAR said it has agreed with Georgian authorties to build the plant by the end of 2019. The refinery will cost $120m to build and will have a capacity of 2m tonnes/year.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Armenia to receive arms from Russia

MAY 22 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Hovik Abrahamyan, Armenia’s PM, said Russia had started delivering arms as part of a deal worth $200m. The arms deal was announced a few days after Armenian leader Serzh Sargsyan and Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev met for the first time since fighting broke out between the two neighbours around the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh in April.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Tajikistan bans flag import

MAY 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajikstandard, a government agency, proposed a ban on imports of Tajik flags made in Turkey or China. Abdukakhor Mavlonzoda, the head of Tajikstandard, told US-funded RFE/RL that foreign-made flags carry an important mistake in the way the crown at the centre of the flag is displayed. The ban could come in handy for the government’s nation building agenda.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Batumi’s other poorer and dislocated side

BATUMI/Georgia, MAY 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — With its palm tree-lined boulevards, this city on the Black Sea coast is Georgia’s best known tourist destination.

It has boomed over the past decade and will soon host the world’s sixth largest hotel in the form of the 45-storey Twin Tower.

But there is a darker side.

On the outskirts of Batumi, several thousand people live in dilapidated barracks. Since October 2012, migrants and socially deprived people have been living in an abandoned Russian military base, now one of the biggest shantytowns in Georgia.

Its dwellers call it Ocnebis Kalaki. In English, this means Dream Town. It is a joke, a dark joke.

Water is available for only a few hours a day, there are frequent power cuts, gas is not provided and a rudimental sewage system increases the risk of infections and diseases.

Most of the families live in very small, poorly-built rooms. A family of eight share a two-room shack made out of wood, cement-asbestos, metal sheets and cardboard.

These people live on the fringe of Georgian society.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)