Category Archives: Uncategorised

Kyrgyzstan becomes ideological battleground

OCT. 31 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – In an article for a policy website, the US ambassador in Bishkek, Pamela Spratlen, appeared to cement Kyrgyzstan’s place as an ideological sparring ground between Washington and the Kremlin.

In particular, Ms Spratlen, who has been the US ambassador to Kyrgyzstan since April 2011 highlighted the differences between Washington and the Kremlin over Russia’s aim to pull Kyrgyzstan into the Eurasian Economic Union as well as their divergent views over gay rights.

“Another challenge to our efforts to support Kyrgyzstan’s democracy is its growing partnership with Russia,” she wrote on Council of American Ambassadors website, a website for essays written by senior US diplomats. “It remains an unanswered question how Kyrgyzstan can maintain its democratic trajectory while pursuing this partnership.”

Ms Spratlen specifically said the Customs Union, which will become the Eurasian Economic Union next year and grow to include Kyrgyzstan and Armenia alongside Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus, was as much about politics as economics.

Legislation passing through Kyrgyzstan’s parliament bears all the hallmarks of Russian political influence. A parliamentary bill forbidding “positive attitudes towards non-traditional sexual orientations” was overwhelmingly endorsed at its first reading last month, echoing a similar bill passed in 2013 in Russia.

Importantly, Ms Spratlen said Kyrgyzstan may be sleep walking into membership of the Eurasian Economic Union because it feels like it has no choice, especially as it is surrounded by more authoritarian countries in Central Asia.

“Both officials and business leaders appear unenthused, but resigned to this choice, seeing a lack of better options,” she wrote.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Azerbaijan’s C.Bank warns on excessive consumer borrowing

NOV. 4 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s economy is, in general, holding firm despite problems in Russia and falling price of oil. That said, a growing household debt problem is threatening to undermine its relatively good position.

The Central Bank said that in the nine months to the end of September, consumers’ overdue loans had risen by over 22%.

Azerbaijanis are enjoying increasingly easy access to cash, something that international institutions and economists have told the Azerbaijani authorities to tighten up.

Lending but not the checks and balances needed for a sensible lending policy, have grown exponentially over the past two or three years.

In an article for the news site Media forum, the economist Samir Aliyev said that these disparages could cause serious problems for Azerbaijan.

“The share of these (consumer) loans increased by 16.7% in the last nine months,” he said of bank’s loan portfolio. “There has also been a decrease in the assets of the bank.”

This is a bad combination. Azerbaijani banks have been warned time and again to impose tighter controls over lending. If they don’t, the banks may find that they are holding a large proportion of bad consumer debt.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Russia may block food transport

OCT. 30 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Russia may block trucks and trains carrying food from the EU and Norway to Kazakhstan from travelling across it territory because of an import ban. Russia has banned produce from the EU and Norway in retaliation for sanctions imposed by the West.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

BP to shut oil field for a month in Azerbaijan

OCT. 31 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – BP said it would shut down one of Azerbaijan’s biggest oil fields — Central Azeri — for the whole of November for essential repair work. The shutdown will hit Azerbaijan’s oil output which is already under pressure.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Tajik food imports to rise

NOV. 3 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan will have to increase its imports of grain over the next three years to cover a growing population, a ministry of economic development official told Tajik media. The news will disappoint analysts who had hoped that a gradual rise in grain production would reduce expensive imports.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

IDB funds rural housing in Uzbekistan

NOV. 3 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Islamic Development Bank has agreed to loan Uzbekistan $100m to build extra rural housing, media reported. This is the second major loan by intergovernmental agencies for rural housing in Uzbekistan. In 2011, the Asian Development Bank approved a loan of $500m.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Turkmenistan ponders security

OCT. 30 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan may officially be neutral but it is still discussing regional security issues with NATO.

NATO’s liaison officer for Central Asia Alexander Vinnikov met with Turkmen officials to discuss various bilateral security options, media reported. This was the second major security meeting held by Turkmenistan in October. Earlier in the month President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov met with Uzbek President Islam Karimov to discuss cooperation.

The main worry for Turkmenistan is the growing Taliban threat along its border with Afghanistan. The Taliban has increased their activities, triggering the Turkmen military to bolster its defences.

It’s also concerned about a re-galvanised Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan (IMU). The IMU emerged in the 1990s and had targeted Uzbekistan. In the 2000s it joined the Taliban fighting NATO forces in Afghanistan and this year claimed responsibility for an attack on Karachi airport. More recently, the IMU has publicly declared its support for the so-called Islamic State extremist group which is fighting in Syria and Iraq.

If the IMU did become a major threat to Central Asian states once again, Turkmenistan, with all its gas riches and long border with Afghanistan, could well be in its sights.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Georgia PM sacks defence minister

NOV. 4 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s PM Irakli Garbishvili sacked his defence minister Irakli Alasania for insubordination, throwing the coalition government into its most severe test of credibility since winning power at a parliamentary election in 2012 and then a presidential election in 2013.

Mr Alasania is head of the Free Democrats party which could withdraw its support for the Georgian Dream, the opposition coalition put together by Georgia’s richest man Bidzine Ivanishvili to oust Mikheil Saakshvili from power.

Georgian foreign minister, Maia Panjikidze, and Aleksi Petriashvili, the minister for European and Euro-Atlantic Integration, are also members of the Free Democrats and are likely to resign from the government.

Without the 10 Free Democrats MPs, Georgia Dream loses its majority in Georgia’s parliament. It drops its representation to 75 MPs, out of 150.

Reports from Tbilisi said Mr Alasania was furious about the arrest of 10 officials from the ministry of defence for alleged corruption. He countered that the officials were innocent and that the arrests were part of a plot to undermine his staunchly pro-NATO and pro-Western agenda. The current government is broadly pro-West too, although it has mended ties with Russia.

Mr Alasania was on a trip to Europe when the arrests took place. Despite a busy schedule he still found time to openly criticise the arrests. This was enough for his boss, Mr Garbishvili, probably with the support of Mr Ivanishvili, to fire him.

Mr Alasania is a popular politician. His sacking has shaken Georgian politics.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Georgia and Armenia build power line

NOV. 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia and Georgia are building a €300m electrical line between the two countries, Armenian energy minister Ara Simonyan told a cabinet meeting. The power line will improve the Georgian and Armenian electricity grid and help solidify the countries’ trade relations.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)

Uzbekistan’s sum drops 20%

OCT. 30 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbekistan’s sum currency lost 20% of its value over a few days because of the depreciation of the Rouble, Russian media reported quoting a Central Bank official. Economists have warned of a ripple effect across Central Asia from the worsening Russian economy.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)