OCT. 7 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Russia’s base in Tajikistan is essential for regional security Russian parliamentarian Sergei Naryshkin said on an official visit to Dushanbe. After a one year delay, Tajikistan’s parliament on Oct. 1 ratified a deal to extend by 30 years Russia’s lease on the base, its largest overseas operation.
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(News report from Issue No. 155, published on Oct. 9 2013)
OCT. 7 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Georgian government said it may withdraw its team from the 2014 Winter Olympics in Russia after a Russian soldier who fought in the 2008 against Georgia was named as one of the torch bearers. Georgia had said it wouldn’t send a team to Sochi but the government of PM Bidzina Ivanishvili reversed this.
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(News report from Issue No. 155, published on Oct. 9 2013)
OCT. 9 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Trouble appears to be brewing on the border between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan.
Traditionally, Uzbekistan closes its border with its southern neighbour for 72 hours around its Independence Day celebrations on Sept. 1 each year. This year, though, the border remains shut, more than one month later.
Media also reported that Uzbek officials had cancelled a deal made in June with Turkmenistan that allowed citizens from both countries to visit the other for three days without a visa.
It’s unclear what exactly has happened or when, although officials from Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan did meet in Bukhara at the end of last month to discuss border issues.
Whatever the official reasons for the border problems, the implications are fairly serious. Business and families are cross border affairs and detouring to the nearest consulates for visas and various permissions to travel is a time consuming tedious business.
One agency that will benefit from the confusion is the border guards’ service. The guards on the borders are notoriously corrupt and, although officially closed, people will still be crossing back and forth. The size of the bribe they need to pay will have increased.
Uzbekistan currently imposes visa requirements on citizens of Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Kyrgyzstan but not Russia or Kazakhstan.
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(News report from Issue No. 155, published on Oct. 9 2013)
OCT. 2 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s envoy to the UN, Agshin Mehdiyev, accused Armenia of using refugees from Syria to bolster its hold on Nagorno-Karabakh, the sliver of land that the two countries dispute. Roughly 10,000 ethnic Armenians have fled a civil war in Syria. Reports have said that Armenia has resettled some of them in Nagorno-Karabakh.
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(News report from Issue No. 155, published on Oct. 9 2013)
SEPT. 27 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Shaking off the West’s child labour accusations, Uzbekistan signed a major cotton export deal with China, media reported. Uzbekistan will now export 300,000 tonnes of cotton fibre to China, half its total production.
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
YEREVAN/Armenia, OCT. 2 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — President Serzh Sargsyan’s announcement last month that Armenia will join the Russia-led Customs Union was a surprise both for officials and local people.
Armenia has been negotiating to join the EU for four years and a document representing progress was expected to be signed in November in Vilnius, Lithuania. Still, 14 of the 20 people interviewed by The Conway Bulletin on a mild September evening in central Yerevan supported the move.
Importantly, though, they backed Armenia’s entry into the Customs Union, which also includes Kazakhstan and Belarus, not to improve their economic prospects but because they considered Russia the best defender of peace from perceived Azerbaijani aggression.
Armenia and Azerbaijan are still officially at war over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. Russia maintains a large military base in Armenia.
“We’re living in very dangerous times. Syria, Nagorno-Karabakh, Iran, war. We’ve no other alternative,” said 33-year-old Minasyan Levon.
Liana Gevorgyan agreed. “We’ve no choice,” she said. “It’s better than feeling insecure.”
Some also said Russia’s traditional Christian Orthodox values were important.
“The EU is not only about trade, it’s also about homosexuals, feminism and a range of Western moral norms which ruins our country and its identity,” said Davit, 40.
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(Correspondent’s Notebook from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
SEPT. 25 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Indian officials have been negotiating with their Kazakh counterparts to buy into various energy projects since missing out on a stake in the Kashagan Caspian Sea oil field earlier this year, media reported. India thought it had secured an 8.3% share of Kashagan for $5b only for Kazakhstan to hand the stake to China.
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
SEPT. 25 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbekistan will allow five more airports, mainly in the eastern Ferghana Valley, to accept international flights, media reported. The flights are likely to serve Russia where labourers head for jobs, underlining the importance of Uzbekistan’s migrant workforce to its economy.
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
OCT. 1 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — For the second time, Azerbaijan took over the presidency of the UN’s Security Council on Oct. 1.
Members of the UN Security Council, five permanent members and 10 non-permanent members, hold the presidency for one month at a time. It’s an organisational role but still a prestigious and important one.
Azerbaijan became the third former Soviet state, Russia is a permanent member and Ukraine has been a non-permanent member previously, to sit on the UN Security Council when it was elected as the East Europe region’s representative in 2011. Its term runs from Jan. 1 2012 until Dec. 31 2013.
It may be a rotating position but it is still much coveted. Kyrgyzstan unsuccessfully ran for a position in 2011 and Kazakhstan is openly campaigning for a place.
Azerbaijan held the presidency of the UN Security Council in May 2012. Syria and its chemical weapons will be top of the agenda this time round.
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
SEPT. 30 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Seeking to carve out a global role for Turkmenistan, Turkmen deputy PM, Rashid Meredov, proposed holding UN meetings next year to discuss disarmament, energy security, transit issues, desertification, and refugees. Mr Meredov suggested that Ashgabat, fittingly, could host the meeting on desertification.
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)
