Category Archives: Uncategorised

Armenian businessman reports agression

AUG. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Arsen Avetisian, majority shareholder in Air Armenia, said he was beaten up in central Yerevan after meeting with Ruben Hayrapetian, another wealthy Armenian businessman. Mr Avetisian declined to give media full details of his row. Air Armenia is Armenia’s largest private airline. It has not flown since last year when it was declared bankrupt.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 244, published on Aug. 21 2015)

Kazakhstan devalues the tenge by 23%

ALMATY/Kazakhstan, AUG. 21 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan gave up its defence of the tenge by ditching a peg to the US dollar which had cost it billions to enforce, a move that knocked 23% off the currency’s value .

Businesses, policy makers and analysts will now be watching for a subsequent rise in inflation, as well as possible social unrest, in Kazakhstan.

At a government meeting broadcast on national television, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev said that the depreciation of the Russian rouble and a sharp fall in oil prices in the past year meant that it was becoming far too costly to defend the tenge.

“Let us face it, this is a necessary measure, there was no other alternative. Crisis always brings about change,” he said.

This is a major policy shift for Kazakhstan which had been alone in the Central Asia and South Caucasus region in stubbornly defending its currency. Perhaps the sudden devaluation of the Chinese yuan earlier this month was the trigger for the Kazakh devaluation.

Kazakh exporters had been struggling as their products became more expensive.

The devaluation will also damage the reputation of the Central Bank and the tenge. This is its second devaluation in 18 months. Since February 2014, the tenge has lost 39% of its value.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 244, published on Aug. 21 2015)

Azerbaijan, Turkey, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan plan TV station

AUG. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – At a meeting in Astana, information ministers from Azerbaijan, Turkey, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan agreed to set up a news channel which will promote a so-called Turkic view of the world. These countries, and especially Azerbaijan, have become frustrated with what they view as biased coverage in Western media.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 244, published on Aug. 21 2015)

Georgia accuses Russia of helicopter flight

AUG. 19 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s government accused Russia of flying a military helicopter into its air space around the border of the breakaway region of South Ossetia. Earlier this year South Ossetian forces apparently grabbed a slither of Georgian territory. Russia is also staging large scale military exercises in South Ossetia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 244, published on Aug. 21 2015)

Tajikistan asks for opposition extraditions

AUG. 17/19 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Officials in Tajikistan appeared to ramp up their crackdown on opposition members by filing extradition requests to Russia and Moldova for people linked to the banned Group 24. Earlier this year the exiled head of Group 24, Umarali Kuvvatov, was shot dead in Istanbul.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 244, published on Aug. 21 2015)

Russia builds radar in Azerbaijan

AUG. 17 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Russia will build a new radar system in Azerbaijan, its ministry of defence said in a TV broadcast, underlining just how links between the two countries have developed. It will replace a radar station at Qabala that Russia had leased from Azerbaijan. In 2012 Azerbaijan declined to sign a lease extension on the radar at Qabala to Russia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 244, published on Aug. 21 2015)

Kyrgyzstan joins EEU

AUG. 12 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan formally joined the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union when it dropped customs barriers with its neighbour Kazakhstan, which is also a member. Both Kyrgyz president Almazbek Atambayev and Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev attended a ceremony to mark the occasion. Belarus and Armenia are also members of the group which some critics have said is an underhand way for Russia to increase its political influence.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 243, published on Aug. 14 2015)

Azerbaijan jails prominent human rights defenders

AUG. 13 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Azerbaijan sentenced human rights defenders Leyla and Arif Yunus to 8-1/2 and 7 years in prison for financial crimes, in what their supporters said was a sham trial.

Tanya Lokshina, a Human Rights Watch researcher based in Moscow, attended the sentencing.

“No matter what technical and legalistic pretexts the authorities are now using to lock up and destroy the Yunuses, one glance into that courtroom leaves you with no shadow of a doubt — this is a political trial and the supposed perpetrators are in fact victims of a vicious repression campaign against independent critics,” she wrote in a story on the Guardian website.

The Yunuses are just the latest human rights defenders, opposition activists or troublesome journalist to be sent to jail in Azerbaijan. The authorities have responded by saying that the West is mounting a concerted effort to blacken its name with negative PR.

But, perhaps, a precedent has been set. Attitudes towards free speech in Azerbaijan appear very dim as the death of another journalist on Aug. 8 appears to show.

Razim Aliyev died after he was beaten up apparently for criticising on Facebook international Azerbaijani footballer Javid Huseynov for making a politically sensitive gesture at a match between his club Gabala and a Cypriot team. Police have detained six men, including Mr Huseynov.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 243, published on Aug. 14 2015)

Bridge collapse in Uzbekistan kills 15 people

AUG. 8 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – At least 15 people died in Uzbekistan when a bridge they were watching a concert from collapsed, media reported. The accident happened in a park in the town of Urgench, west Uzbekistan. It highlights the poor quality of many public buildings.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 243, published on Aug. 14 2015)

Kazakh President appoints EXPO chief

AUG. 10 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev appointed Akhmetzhan Yessimov, formerly the mayor of Almaty, to head his set piece EXPO-2017 in Astana. Mr Yessimov is a trusted ally of Mr Nazarbayev and is tasked with bringing EXPO-2017 back on track after a major corruption scandal. Baurzhan Baibek, an official at Mr Nazarbayev’s Nur Otan, will be the new Almaty mayor.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 243, published on Aug. 14 2015)