Tag Archives: law

Georgian Parliament to introduce new, easier, visa regulations

MAY 1 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia is on the cusp of easing visa regulations which were tightened eight months ago on the premise of being in line with EU regulations.

Parliament has passed two readings of the visa bill and the final vote is scheduled for later this month.

Georgia’s economy is reliant on foreign investment and Eric Livny, director of International School of Economics at Tbilisi State University, said any relaxation of migration rules would be positive.

“Georgia should use the current opportunity to liberalise its visa regime with Europe while staying as open as possible to the outside world,” he said.

The bill reinstates the 360-day visa-free stay for citizens and permanent residents of countries listed by the government. Most likely, this will include EU members and the US. The changes also include simpler procedures and lower fees for obtaining Georgian visa and residence permit.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 230, published on May 6 2015)

Tajikistan jails Islamic extremists

MAY 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in south Tajikistan sentenced 10 men to 8-1/2 years in prison each for being members of the banned Islamic extremist group Jamaat Ansarullah. Jamaat Ansarullah is an offshoot of the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan, blamed for a series of attacks over the past couple of decades in Central Asia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 230, published on May 6 2015)

Azerbaijan restricts people’s right to travel

APRIL 28 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Milli Majlis, the Azerbaijani Parliament approved an amendment to the Criminal Code which will punish citizens for not notifying the government within a month when they receive citizenship for another country.

Opposition members criticised the new law for imposing repressive legislation designed to increase the government’s control of its people.

Under the new law, citizens will be fined between 3,000 and 5,000 manat ($2,800-$4,750) or receive 360 to 480 hours of public service for not notifying the Azerbaijani authorities that they have taken a second nationality.

Azerbaijan already outlaws dual nationality but the existing laws did not contain a penalty.

Lawyer Muzaffar Baxishov of the Legal State Research Foundation, an Azerbaijani NGO told the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty that the government wants to create obstacles for its critics.

“People will have to inform the government about new citizenship, otherwise they will be involved in a criminal case,” he said.

The US and the EU have both heavily criticised Azerbaijan for crushing dissent over the past few years. Many of Azerbaijan’s opposition groups gather emotional and financial support from outside the country. The government has already moved to restrict its citizens’ travel.

Under regulation introduced in January, Azerbaijanis now have to inform their embassies that they are residing in a country, even if temporarily. Previously, Azerbaijani citizens only had to tell embassies if they intended to stay in a country permanently.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 229, published on April 29 2015)

Armenia remembers 1915

APRIL 24 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia officially marked the 100th anniversary of the killing of thousands of its countrymen by Ottoman Turks, an event it wants recognised as a genocide.

On the eve of the ceremony in Yerevan, Germany’s parliament, the Bundestag, joined a growing list of countries calling the death of up to 1.5m Armenians a genocide.

“What happened in the middle of the First World War in the Ottoman Empire under the eyes of the world was a genocide,” media quoted Bundestag Presi- dent Norbert Lammert as saying at the debate on the issue.

The issue is sensitive in Germany as historians have said Nazi leader Adolf Hitler used the killings of the Armenians in the east of modern-day Turkey as evidence the world would turn a blind eye to his plans to kill Jews in Europe.

Presiding over the sombre ceremony in Yerevan, Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan said: “Recognition of the genocide is a triumph of human conscience and justice over intolerance and hatred.”

Russian President Vladimir Putin and French President Francois Hollande were among the foreign dignitaries to attend the service.

The US sent a delegation but President Barack Obama has pointedly steered away from describing the deaths as a genocide.

Turkey has denied the genocide. It says Armenians died in the chaos around the final days of the Ottoman Empire.

Turkish President Tayyip Erdogan has said that he feels Armenia’s pain over the killings but he is quick to criticise descriptions of the deaths as a genocide.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 229, published on April 29 2015)

Kazakhstan jails Ukraine fighter

APRIL 27 2015(The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Atyrau in western Kazakhstan sentenced an unnamed 27-year-old man to jail for three years for fighting with pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine, media reported. Radio Free Europe said this was the second case this year.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 229, published on April 29 2015)

Greece refuse Georgia’s extradition request

APRIL 26 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Greece rejected an extradition request from Georgia for its ex-domestic intelligence chief, Data Akhalaia. Reports did not specify just why Greece’s Supreme Court had turned down Georgia’s request but Europe and the US have accused Georgia of using the law to settle vendettas.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 229, published on April 29 2015)

Saakashvili visiting Azerbaijan

APRIL 29 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia has filed an extradition request to Azerbaijan for former president Mikheil Saakashvili, media reported. Mr Saakashvili, who is now based in New York and Kiev and is an adviser to the pro- Western Ukraine government, is visiting Azerbaijan for a conference.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 229, published on April 29 2015)

Interpol removed Georgian Prosecutors notice

APRIL 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – In a snub to the Georgian Prosecutor-General, Interpol removed a wanted notice on former justice minister Zurab Adeishvili. The EU and the US have said the Georgia legislation targets governing Georgian Dream coalition is using legal mechanisms to go after officials linked to former President Mikheil Saakashvili.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 228, published on April 22 2015)

Armenia plans update to torture definition

MARCH 26 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia will update its definition of the term torture to meet international standards, the London-based media NGO Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR) said. The update, the IWPR reported, was aimed at cracking down on police torture.
ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 225, published on April 12015)

Kazakh court convicts 3 policemen of torture

MARCH 18 2015 (The Bulletin) – A court in Aktobe, west Kazakhstan, convicted three police officers of torturing a robbery suspect, media reported. The sentence is a rare victory for rights activists who say torture is used by Kazakh police to extract confessions.
ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 223, published on March 18 2015)