Tag Archives: Kyrgyzstan

Kyrgyz president awards Kazakh leader

JULY 6 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – BISHKEK — Kyrgyz president Almazbek Atambayev awarded Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev the Order of Manas (First Class), Kyrgyzstan’s highest honour, for helping to create the Eurasian Economic Union.

He flew to Astana to give Mr Nazarbayev the award on his 75th birthday, five days after the Kazakh leader ratified Kyrgyzstan’s accession into the Kremlin-led Eurasian Economic Union.

“We feel a strong fraternal support from the Republic of Kazakhstan,” Mr Atambayev said, according to media.

Toktogul Kakcheckeyev, an executive director at the Association of Political Scientists of Kyrgyzstan think tank in Bishkek, explained.

“The Manas award was given by Almazbek Atambayev to Nursultan Nazarbayev because of Nazarbayev’s efforts to develop regional cooperation in terms of Eurasian economic community,” he said. “Originally it was Nazarbayev’s idea to launch regional economic cooperation.”

In 1994, shortly after the fall of the Soviet Union in a speech in Moscow, Mr Nazarbayev spoke rather nostalgically of creating a Eurasian Union. This has now materialised, or, at least a version of that vision.

Still, some observers have said that Mr Atambayev’s award to Mr Nazarbayev was a brazen attempt to curry favour with the most powerful leader in Central Asia.

And Kyrgyzstan has form with this. The Kyrgyz parliament can be relied upon, almost every year, to nominate Mr Nazarbayev for a Nobel Peace Prize for giving up the nuclear weapons that Kazakhstan inherited after the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union.

Mr Nazarbayev is only the twelfth recipient of a First Class Order of Manas in its 19 year history.

Other recipients include Kofi Annan, the former UN Secretary- General.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)

Residents of Kyrgyz capital prepare for petrol price rises

BISHKEK/KYRGYZSTAN, JULY 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Timur, a car mechanic in Bishkek, was more sanguine than most about impending petrol price rises.

“I do not think the fuel price increase will bother me,” the 23-year-old said. “There are always ups and downs in fuel price.”

Analysts in Kyrgyzstan anticipate a fuel price rise of between 7-15% this year because of the introduction of an excise tax that the government has introduced to plug a hole it is finances.

It’s a price rise that is all but certain to irritate ordinary Kyrgyz who have seen the value of their som savings plummet over the past few months and inflation slowly accelerate.

Russian importers dominate Kyrgyzstan’s petrol imports and, effectively set prices. The Kyrgyz government, though, has said that it wants to bring in a tax on fuel that will make up a shortfall generated by a drop in income during the recent downturn in economic fortunes. Like the rest of Central Asia, Kyrgyzstan’s economy is closely tied to Russia. The Russian economy has floundered because of a fall in oil prices and Western-imposed sanctions.

In March, the Kyrgyz government said that it was going to slap the tax on fuel and alcohol. Initially, analysts said the new tax was needed to bring the country in line with its future partners in the Eurasian Economic Union. Kyrgyzstan is set to join the economic group, which also includes Kazakhstan, Belarus and Armenia, this year.

And on the streets of Bishkek, other than Timur, the mechanic, people were increasingly frustrated. Taxi drivers said that whatever happened they would pay more for petrol but the same fee to rent the car.

“Of course, it is bad because we, as taxi drivers, pay for fuel on our own. Whether the fuel price is moderate or high, we pay the same percentage to the taxi service owners [to hire the taxis],” said a young man driving his car.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)

Kyrgyzstan supports SCO expansion

JULY 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyz Pres. Almazbek Atambayev said he would support expanding the Russia and China led Shanghai Corporation Organisation (SCO) to include Iran, Pakistan and India, local media reported. The SCO is holding a summit meeting in Ufa, Russia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)

Kyrgyz Central Bank initiates capitalisation criteria

JULY 1 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Commercial banks in Kyrgyzstan’s need to meet a minimum capitalisation level, the Central Bank said, part of an ongoing process to professionalise the banking sector and protect it against another Global Financial Crisis. By 2017, commercial banks in Kyrgyzstan will need a working capital of nearly $10m.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 238, published on July 2 2015)

Kyrgyz MPs sack judge

JUNE 24 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – BISHKEK — MPs in Kyrgyzstan voted to sack a judge over a row about biometric data in what civil activists described as more evidence of parliament’s authoritarian tendencies.

Protesters gathered in the centre of Bishkek to demonstrate against the apparent sacking of Klara Sooronkulova, a judge in the Constitutional Chamber of the Kyrgyz Supreme Court.

She had been working on a document that would have declared a law brought in last year forcing everybody in Kyrgyzstan to give their fingerprint data to the state as unconstitutional.

“Sooronkulova was dismissed only because she expressed her opinion as an independent judge,” shouted Nurbek Toktakunov, a lawyer, at the protest.

The law that Ms Sooronkulova took umbridge with decreed that only those people who had submitted biometric data could vote in a parliamentary election set for October.

She said that this was unlawful. Apparently irritated by her reluctance to accept the law on biometric data, the government forced MPs to vote three times to sack her. She survived the first two efforts.

“This is a clear evidence of complete arbitrariness,” Ms Sooronkulova told a newspaper.

It’s unlikely that protests will gather momentum but the independence of the judiciary from the executive power has been damaged in Kyrgyzstan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 238, published on July 2 2015)

Kyrgyz interest rates stay steady

JUNE 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan’s Central Bank kept its interest rates steady at 9.5%, despite inflation falling. The Central Bank is trying to weigh up protecting its som currency from devaluing and also stopping inflation dropping too low. Inflation dropped to 4.8%, down by half since the beginning of the year.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 238, published on July 2 2015)

Kyrgyz reserves increase

JUNE 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan’s Central Bank has been steadily rebuilding its gold and foreign currency reserves since reaching a low in April, media reported. Last year Kyrgyzstan’s Central Bank spent frantically as it tried to prop up its falling currency.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 238, published on July 2 2015)

Gazprom hints at Kyrgyz gas price rise

JUNE 25 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Gazprom wants to raise the price that consumers in Kyrgyzstan pay for their gas, local media reported quoting the director-general of its Kyrgyz subsidiary, Bakyt Abildayev.

This is a particularly sensitive topic because of tense street protests in Yerevan, triggered by the Russian-owned Armenian electricity distributor which wants to raise prices.

“We cannot endlessly subsidize gas industry. I propose to develop a new pricing policy for [the next] three to five years,” Mr Abildayev said.

When Gazprom bought the Kyrgyz gas distribution network in 2013 it was bankrupt and badly needed investment. Gazprom paid a token $1 for the network and promised much needed investment and also to keep prices low. This pleased ordinary Kyrgyz and also the government. It was interpreted as a sweetener as the Kremlin extended its influence over Central Asia and brought Kyrgyzstan into its Eurasian Economic Union (EEU)

Now, though, the situation has changed. Kyrgyzstan has signed up to the EEU and cash is tighter in Russia. The collapse in energy prices has hit Russia hard.

Perhaps this is why, with their allegiance guaranteed, Russia is now looking to increase the price it charges consumers for electricity and gas in Armenia and Kyrgyzstan.

Kyrgyz politics often plays out on the street. If Mr Abildayev is serious about increasing gas prices in Kyrgyzstan, he should probably expect a reaction.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 237, published on June 25 2015)

China invests in Kyrgyz North-South road

JUNE 23 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – China has agreed to give Kyrgyzstan a loan of nearly $300m to complete a new road linking Bishkek with the south of the country, media reported. The road, which crosses inhospitable mountain ranges, is important to the Kyrgyz government to increase its control over the south.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 237, published on June 25 2015)

Kyrgyz anti-gay law proceeds

JUNE 24 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – MPs in Kyrgyzstan voted overwhelmingly to pass the second reading of a controversial law that will ban so-called gay propaganda. To become law, the bill needs to pass a third reading and then be signed by President Almazbek Atambayev. Russia passed a similar law in 2013.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 237, published on June 25 2015)