Tag Archives: Azerbaijan

Seagal flies into Azerbaijan to give President Aliyev a pep talk

SEPT. 21 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Steven Seagal, the Hollywood actor best known for his 1980s and 1990s martial arts movies, pitched up in Azerbaijan to meet President Ilham Aliyev for a chat and photo op.

His acting commitments have waned but the 63-year-old appears to have created a decent business giving pep talks to leaders of ex-Soviet states. His clients include President Vladimir Putin in Russia.

Now Mr Aliyev’ clearly felt he needed Mr Seagal’s help. Relations with Europe and the US have worsened over human rights and vote monitoring.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

BP and Azerbaijan start renegotiating ‘deal of the century’

SEPT. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil and gas company, said it is negotiating the renewal of the so called ‘contract of the century’ it signed with BP over 20 years ago.

The contract concerns the most important set of oil fields in Azerbaijan, Azeri-Chirag-Guneshli — also known as ACG — which is managed through a consortium in which BP has the largest share (35.8%) and SOCAR owns 11.6%.

“We are in talks,” said Rovnag Abdullayev, SOCAR’s chairman, when reporters asked him about the negotiations over the licence.

“Until 2024, BP is the operator at ACG. BP is likely to remain the operation in the future as well.”

BP has not commented but its management of the project is important both for the company and Azerbaijan, which is reliant on oil exports for its earnings.

It may be early to start negotiating an extension to the 30-year Production Sharing Agreement signed in 1994 but BP and Azerbaijan need to cement their fickle relationship.

An economic crisis, triggered by a steep fall in the value of oil over the past year, has hit Azerbaijan, forcing its manat currency to devalue by a third in February.

It has also cut its government budget and spent millions of dollars propping up its ailing currency.

Data from the oil rigs also makes for a dispiriting read. In the first eight months of 2015 oil production decreased by 2.5% compared to the same period in 2014.

ACG is the primary oilfield for Azerbaijan and in 2012 Azerbaijan’s president Ilham Aliyev accused BP of having committing “grave mistakes” in its management of the project. In Jan.-Aug. 2015, production at ACG was down by 2.2%, compared to 2014. BP has tried to maintain production by replacing staff and increasing investment in the fields but it has been unable to stop ACG’s decline.

Last week, BP suspended operations at Chirag for 20 days due to maintenance work which will hit output again.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

OSCE/ODHIR pressures Azerbaijan

SEPT. 19 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan has come under increased international pressure to allow more monitors from the OSCE’s ODHIR into the country to monitor a parliamentary election in November. The OSCE cancelled its monitoring mission because it said the authorities in Azerbaijan had permitted only half the requested monitors.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

BP extends DNV GL deal in Azerbaijan

SEPT. 22 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — BP said it would extend DNV GL’s contract in Azerbaijan’s leading natural gas field for the second stage of operations. Oslo-based DNV GL provides marine warranty and consulting for oil and gas fields globally. The second phase of Shah Deniz sets it up for a massive expansion that will eventually mean more gas being sent to Europe.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

Azerbaijan begins TANAP work

SEPT. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan has begun work on the Trans Anatolian Pipeline (TANAP) project, part of the route that will carry gas from the Caspian Sea to Europe, local media quoted Rovnag Abdullayev, the chairman of Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company SOCAR, as saying. Mr Abdullayev said that 400km of pipes had been delivered to TANAP.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

Azerbaijan’s first lady wants to be MP

SEPT. 21 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Mehriban Aliyeva, wife of Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev, has registered as a candidate in parliamentary elections on Nov. 1, media reported. Ms Aliyeva has not previously shown any political inclination.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

Azerbaijan’s oil fund buys Tokyo shopping centre

SEPT. 23 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Sofaz, the Azerbaijani oil wealth fund, bought property in Japan worth $435m, its first foray into the east Asian property markets.

In a statement, it said that it had teamed up with Mitsubishi UFJ Trust and Banking Corporation to buy the landmark retail property Kirarito Ginza for 52.3b yen.

Shahmar Movsumov, the fund’s executive director, said he was excited by the purchase. “We are delighted to have made our first foray into the Japanese real estate market. Our investment rationale for this asset is based on its capital preservation capacity,” he said.

In the past few years, Sofaz has been developing its property portfolio with purchases in London, Paris, Sydney and Kuala Lumpur. Last month it said that it would reduce payments to the national budget as its earnings had fallen because of the collapse in oil prices.

In July the fund, which holds around $37b earmarked for infrastructure projects, bought $500m of Chinese government bonds, part of planned diversification of its assets.

Kirarito Ginza is a modern retail building built on Tokyo’s Chou Avenue, one of the most prestigious streets in the country.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

Azerbaijani sets fire to himself as protest

SEPT. 21 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A taxi driver from Sumqayit, in western Azerbaijan, has died after setting himself on fire, media reported, an apparent final desperate protest against bully by officials and corruption.

Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty said this was the seventh immolation in Azerbaijan since 2014.

Immolations in the region are a particularly sensitive issue because of the political connotations. The so-called Arab Spring erupted after an immolation by a frustrated and brow- beaten market seller set himself alight in front of a local government building in a provincial town in Tunisia in 2010.

The Arab Spring spread across North Africa, fuelling popular protests which eventually toppled governments in Tunisia, Libya and Egypt.

It also worried Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev and some analysts have said that he started cracking down on opposition figures and media outlets after the Arab Spring undermined some of his allies.

The dead taxi driver was named as 27-year-old Maqsad Suleymanov. The authorities in Sumqayit did not specify how he died but a mass of social media comments and eyewitness reports said he had set himself on fire.

Stock market: KAZ Minerals, Nostrum Oil & Gas

SEPT. 18-24 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — KAZ Minerals shares, now trading at 101 pence, lost over 30% in one week, a fall sharper than the one it suffered last January, when it dropped by more than 25% in one day. Questions on China’s demand

for copper worried investors. Credit Suisse and BNP Paribas downgraded KAZ Minerals and reviewed downwards its target price. Goldman Sachs said there could be a potential upside on Friday and next week.

Nostrum Oil & Gas dropped a further 4% to 481 pence (Sept. 25), although an agreement with Tethys Petroleum seems closer after a company statement said the latest Nostrum offer priced each Tethys share at 0.147 Canadian dollars (Sept. 23).

Azerbaijan-based miner Anglo- Asian Mining gained 13% to 5.38 pence this week, after it published a promising H1 2015 report.

Kazakhstan-focused Roxi Petroleum continued its oil price linked slump, dropping by 4.3% to 8.5 pence this week in London.

In the GDR markets, Kazmunaigas E&P lost almost 20% this week, trading at $6.47 onFriday, almost certainly linked to Kazakhstan’s weak prospects in terms of oil production. Kcell fell by 13.4% finishing the week at $5.35 after TeliaSonera announced last week it would leave its Eurasian markets. TeliaSonera owns 62% of Kcell.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)

Azerbaijani capital turns fancy

BAKU/Azerbaijan, SEPT. 25 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Azerbaijani capital thinks of itself as a cosmopolitan metropolis by the Caspian Sea.

There are big brand hotels, next to rows of designer shops from France, Britain and the United States. The restaurants keep up too. There’s the recently opened Mari Vanna restaurant, which like its London counterpart, looks like an old-style dacha complete with lacy tablecloths, curios and vintage plates. It serves Soviet starters, Russian breads and rustic golubtzi, stuffed cabbage leaves.

Then there is Maya, Baku’s first high-end Mexican restaurant and, if you are the son or daughter of one of Azerbaijan’s business elite and can afford the steep prices, it is one of the places to be seen at in Azerbaijan. Mexican food, with its burritos and tacos and beans and tequila is in-vogue.

Maya sits next to the new modern art exhibition hall Yarat on the edge of the Caspian Sea. This was an area rapidly developed in time for the European Games earlier this year.

Much like other restaurants in Azerbaijan, Maya presents a fusion mix for the senses.

Diners enter through something of a wall of sound. Inside, it was a combination of live Mexican music and chatter. It’s noisy inside, very noisy.

Outside, at the back, a scantily-clad Azeri singer belted out cover version of Hips Don’t Lie and She Wolf originally performed by the US-singer Shakira. Less authentic Mexican but certainly still noisy.

At the tables people ate tacos, burritos and enchiladas. It was a Tuesday evening, around 8.30pm and the crowd was young, dressed up and drunk. One bearded man in a tight black t-shirt sent a puff of shisha smoke into the night air and then let his head fall onto the table. In Azerbaijan, Mexican restaurants have to offer shisha pipes.

People knocked back salt-rimmed glasses of margaritas and danced merrily to the Mariachi band who valiantly played Mexican folk music despite the invasion of Shakira’s music every time a door to the terrace was opened.

Finally, after what seemed like an age, the tacos arrived. But if the atmosphere of the restaurant and the music had been full on, the food was limp. A disappointing finale to a promising evening.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 249, published on Sept. 25 2015)