NOV. 11 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan and Russia are close to agreeing an air defence deal, Russian news agency ITAR-Tass reported quoting officials after a meeting between the two countries’ defence ministries. Russia already has a similar agreement with Kazakhstan.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
NOV. 11 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbek border guards shot and injured a Kyrgyz man along the Uzbekistan- Kyrgyzstan border, media reported. The Uzbekistan- Kyrgyzstan border is one of the most fragile border zones in the region. Analysts have said that any spark could destabilise Central Asia.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
NOV. 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan will donate $100m to Kyrgyzstan, Kyrgyz president Almazbek Atambayev said during a trip to Astana to sign a new electricity supply deal. Mr Atambayev described the aid to Kyrgyzstan as can act of fraternal support from Kazakhstan.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
NOV. 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Asian Development Bank (ADB) has predicted that inflation in Kyrgyzstan will hit 10% in 2015 after it joins the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union. The biggest jump in prices, the ADB said, will be a 30% rise in petrol when prices are brought into line with Kazakhstan and Russia.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
NOV. 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan agreed a deal for Astana to meet most of Bishkek’s electricity deficit, albeit at a price greater than Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev would have wanted to pay.
The deal, finalised during a meeting between Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and Mr Atambayev in Astana, means Kyrgyzstan must pay roughly three times more for the imported electricity than Kyrgyz citizens pay for domestically-produced electricity. Importantly, it also shows Kazakhstan’s political clout in Kyrgyzstan is growing.
An estimated deficit of 2b kilowatt hours (kWh) this year, caused by a shortage of water in its reservoirs, public reaction to shutoffs drove Bishkek and the potential to sign the deal.
Mr Atambayev will be relieved to have made the deal to import 1.4b kWh from Kazakhstan but here are still problems. He will have to make up the shortfall from somewhere else, possibly Turkmenistan, and he will have to finance the extra costs.
Currently the government has suggested modest tariff increases beginning Jan. 1. These are bound to irritate people in Kyrgyzstan.
Other agreements reached by Mr Atambayev and Mr Nazarbayev at the meeting are also indicative and suggested that Kazakhstan maintains significant leverage over its weaker neighbour.
Mr Nazarbayev promised that a fleet of Kyrgyzstan-bound fuel wagons, owned by Russian energy giant Rosneft and held by Kazakh customs officials without explanation since April, would be allowed to cross the two countries’ mutual border. He also pledged a $100 million grant to Kyrgyzstan as the country prepares to enter the Eurasian Economic.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
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.
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(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)
BISHKEK/Kyrgyzstan, NOV 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — It would seem to be a done deal. Despite parliamentary opposition from an unlikely cast of nationalists and liberals — as well as serious concerns on the street — Kyrgyzstan appears to be primed to join Russia, Kazakhstan, and Belarus in the Eurasian Economic Union in 2015.
And, of course, Armenia will accede on the same day.
But accession will be problematic for many Krygyz. The Customs Union, from which the Eurasian Economic Union will emerge, mandates higher tariffs on imports from third countries. China’s share of Kyrgyzstan’s import pie is 55%, dwarfing Russia and Kazakhstan’s combined share of 25%.
Prices for goods from cars to household items will go up significantly. Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev has ceded that inflation is likely to jump in the short term after joining the Eurasian Economic Union.
Such price hikes would be hard to swallow anywhere; in a poor country like Kyrgyzstan, they will be punitive. Many people in Bishkek are afraid and everyone from taxi drivers to professionals, is quick to share their concerns.
One Bishkek-based foreign national in the NGO sector underscored this analysis. “Many fear that the lifeblood of Kyrgyzstan’s economy, cheap goods ranging from cars to shower curtains to raw materials imported from China, will either stop flowing due to newly-imposed tariffs or will dramatically rise in price,” he said, preferring to remain anonymous.
Of course, Russia and Kyrgyzstan are bound in many ways. As many as 500,000 Kyrgyz citizens work in Russia, and Russian news media is widely watched in Kyrgyzstan.
There are, of course, silver linings to Kyrgyzstan’s accession. Kyrgyz citizens working in other EEU countries will not need to register with the police for stays of less than 90 nights. Currently, a Kyrgyz citizen staying longer than five nights is compelled to register.
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(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)
NOV. 3 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Acknowledging that hundreds of Kyrgyz citizens have been fighting in Syria for the Islamic State, an extremist Islamic group, Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev told Kyrgyzstan’s Security Council he was determined to defeat extremism. He said Kyrgyzstan was at risk of “Arabisation”.
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(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)
NOV. 4 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan has agreed to export electricity to Kyrgyzstan to help ease its impending power problems. The deal is likely to be finalised later this week when the leaders of Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan meet. Kyrgyzstan has said low reservoir levels means an electricity shortage this winter.
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(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)
NOV. 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Homosexuals in Kyrgyzstan are considering leaving the country when a law banning gay propaganda is adopted, Reuters reported. The so-called anti-gay law is similar to one already adopted by Russia. “The entire atmosphere is getting more threatening,” one man told Reuters.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)
