Tag Archives: politics

Azerbaijani devaluation angers people

FEB. 21 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s Central Bank slashed the value of its manat currency by a third overnight, a sudden move that took businesses and ordinary Azerbaijanis by surprise.

Previously Azerbaijani officials had said that they would release the manat from its dollar peg, suggesting only a gradual devaluation to adjust to a sharp decline in the Russian rouble.

They have now justified the sudden devaluation by saying that they had little choice but to act in the face of a collapse in oil prices and economic turbulence in Russia.

“This decision was made in order to support diversification of Azerbaijan’s economy, strengthen its international compatibility and export potential as well as to provide balance of payments sustainability,” the Central Bank said in a statement.

On the streets of Azerbaijan’s towns, though, the devaluation was less generously viewed.

Veli, 29, a small business owner in Guba, a northern city, told a Bulletin correspondent that he was in shock.
“I believed the government. I kept my savings in the manat,” he said. “I lost third of my savings. It’s painful. It’s theft by the government.”

He said that he had no choice but to increase the price of the electronic goods he was selling in his shop — fuelling rising inflation.

Sahiba, a mother of two young children living in the city of Gazakh on the western border with Georgia echoed these sentiments. Her husband is a government official but has had his pay cut already this year.

“We’ve got a mortgage,” she said. “I don’t know what we’ll do.”

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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved

(News report from Issue No. 220, published on Feb. 25 2015)

Armenian political row deepens

FEB. 23 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenia’s President Serzh Sargsyan and the main opposition party’s leader, Gagik Tsarukyan, are embroiled in an increasingly bitter and acrimonious row.

Parliamentarians aligned to the Prosperous Armenia party walked out of the national assembly to protest against a government crackdown on Mr Tsarukyan.

They accuse Mr Sargsyan of launching a tax investigation on Mr Tsarukyan for purely vindictive reasons. The argument appears to have started at the beginning of the month with Mr Sargsyan describing the thick-set Mr Tsarukyan as “evil” after he accused the governing Republican Party of complicity in the abduction and beating of an Armenian civil rights protester.

In retaliation for ordering the tax investigation, Mr Tsarukyan called for demonstrations against the government on Feb 20.

The demonstrations didn’t materialise but the image of mainstream politics in Armenia has been tarnished.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved

(News report from Issue No. 220, published on Feb. 25 2015)

OSCE arrives in Tashkent

FEB. 23 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — A limited OSCE election monitoring team arrived in Tashkent to observe Uzbekistan’s March 29 presidential election. The OSCE is Europe’s main democracy watchdog. It has monitored five elections in Uzbekistan since 1999, all of which it said lacked genuine competition and debate.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved

(News report from Issue No. 220, published on Feb. 25 2015)

Karimov reappears in public

FEB. 19 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — After two weeks out of public sight, Uzbek president Islam Karimov resurfaced at an election rally in Kashkadaryo, in the south of the country.

At the rally, broadcast on state television, he vigorously told watchers to work together harmoniously to build up civil society.

The carefully stage-managed appearance was necessary because Mr Karimov had to, effectively, remind his countrymen that he is still in charge and is healthy, despite rumours of the opposite.

Mr Karimov’s disappearances are a talking point because they generally trigger gossip and musings on his health. Now, barely a month before a presidential election that Mr Karimov is expected to win, that speculation was intensified.

He was last seen at the beginning of February accepting the credentials of the new US ambassador to Uzbekistan.
Uzbekistan is, currently, relatively unstable. Mr Karimov is 77-years-old and without an apparent successor.

His daughter, Gulnara, is under house arrest and the security service chiefs appear stronger than ever. It is not even clear how much authority Mr Karimov holds on a day-to-day basis.

And all this instability is worrying for the West, analysts have said. They think that the West would prefer a strong President Karimov to contain any nascent signs of growing Islamic extremism.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved

(News report from Issue No. 220, published on Feb. 25 2015)

France seizes Karimova’s property

FEB. 13 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — The French authorities have seized properties worth millions of euros belonging to Gulnara Karimova, the daughter of Uzbek president Islam Karimov, media reported. One of the properties was an estate near Paris which had its own opera house. Ms Karimova, once a potential presidential successor, is under house arrest in Tashkent.
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(News report from Issue No. 219, published on Feb. 18 2015)

Armenia opposition say they are harrassed

FEB. 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Gagik Tsarikian, head of the opposition Prosperous Armenia Party, has accused the government of harassing his staff and sacking police tasked with defending his property, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported. Mr Tsarikian said President Serzh Sargsyan ordered the tax police to close his operations.
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(News report from Issue No. 219, published on Feb. 18 2015)

Kazakhstan to go for early elections

>>Early vote is a tried and tested strategy>>

FEB. 14 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh president Nursultan Nazarbayev looks set to bring forward a presidential election by a year, a move designed to impose stability during a turbulent economic period.

The Assembly of the People of Kazakhstan asked parliament to bring forward a presidential election from 2016 to this spring.

“It is crucial to strengthen the economy and ensure the continuity of the current policy by holding an early election,” the assembly, a constitutional body headed by Mr Nazarbayev, said in a statement.

Since then the country’s biggest political party Nur Otan has voiced its support for an early election.

The dire economic situation has been a constant headache for the Kazakh leadership in the past few months, especially after the plunge in oil prices and the collapse of the Russian rouble.

The Kazakh elite view extending Mr Nazarbayev’s term in office by another five years as a way of imposing stability. Kazakhstan, also, has form with bringing elections forward. It brought an election in 2011 forward. Mr Nazarbayev won with 96% of the votes.

Experts were waiting for an announcement of this sort.

Kazakhstan’s political watchers had often ended conversations with Bulletin correspondents with: “We are waiting for an early election, to guarantee medium-term stability.”

It appears that their predictions have been borne out. It still remains to be seen, though, whether these elections will calm an increasingly turbulent political and economic environment.
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(News report from Issue No. 219, published on Feb. 18 2015)

Uzbekistan frees political prisoners

>>Releases linked to election in March>>

FEB. 12 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — The authorities in Uzbekistan unexpectedly released Khayrulla Khamidov a sports commentator imprisoned in 2010.

As well as being a soccer commentator, Mr Khamidov was a popular religious speaker who had a large following. He produced CDs and spoke at weddings on social issues.

When he was arrested, on charges of setting up an illegal religious organisation, his supporters said it was an attempt by the authorities to dampen a popular social commentator who they considered was a growing threat to stability. He was imprisoned for six years.

Mr Khamidov’s release, then, appears to be a large concession. Human rights groups have long criticised Uzbekistan for its harsh record against religion. Perhaps, though, this is beginning to change.

The Tashkent-based Initiative Group of Independent Human Rights Advocates of Uzbekistan has said 16 other religious prisoners were released alongside Mr Khamidov.

No official reason for the release has been given although ordinary Uzbeks believe it is linked to a presidential election set for March 29.

Uzbekistan is in flux at the moment. Islam Karimov, who has ruled over the country since the end of the Soviet Union in 1991, is increasingly frail. The election in March and what goes before and after it are increasingly important to monitor.
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(News report from Issue No. 219, published on Feb. 18 2015)

Ukraine appoints Saakashvili

>>Appointment angers Tbilisi who want him extradited>>

FEB. 13 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — In a surprise move, Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko appointed Russia’s arch foe, Mikheil Saakashvili, as an adviser and an official overseas representative of the government.

The appointment has irritated Georgia’s government who want Mr Saakashvili, a former Georgian president, extradited.
They accuse him of various crimes and have placed him on the Interpol wanted list. Since leaving office in 2013, Mr Saakashvili has lived in New York.

“For a long time, we’ve been thinking how to use the knowledge, experience and unique know-how of Mikheil Saakashvili in the best way,” Mr Poroshenko’s press service said. “Until recently, Mikheil was, in fact, a freelance consultant of Ukraine on reforms. And now, finally, he gets official status.”

His arch rival in Georgia, the head of the coalition which chased him from power after nearly 10 years, Bidzina Ivanishvili, saw it differently. He said several members of Mr Saakashvili’s government now worked in Ukraine and that most are wanted on corruption charges in Tbilisi.

“Now they have found asylum in Ukraine, but let us wish for them that events develop in a better way there,” he said in an interview with Georgian media.

The appointment of Mr Saakashvili to the Ukraine government will also anger Russian president Vladimir Putin. The men were locked in a personal battle during their presidencies which culminated in a brief war in 2008.
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(News report from Issue No. 219, published on Feb. 18 2015)

Armenia passes business law

FEB. 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Despite protests, Armenia’s parliament passed a law that will reduce tax imposed on small businesses to 1% of sales from 3.5%. The proposed law has angered businesses because it will mean that they have to provide more paperwork. Armenian PM Armen Rustamyan said the law would be introduced in July, a delay of six months.
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(News report from Issue No. 218, published on Feb. 11 2015)