May 17 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgian Orthodox groups rallied in Tbilisi against a new law designed to protect same-sex relationships. Media estimated that there were several hundred people at the rally, underlining the conservative nature of Georgian society. The Georgian Orthodox Church retains a lot of power in Georgia.
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(News report from Issue No. 185, published on May 21 2014)
MAY 12 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The head of the Georgian Orthodox Church Patriarch Ilia II called for people to mark a new day of “Strength of Family and Respect for Parents” on May 17, the same day as the International Day Against Homophobia. The Orthodox Church is regarded as anti-gay rights. Georgia has introduced a law protecting same-sex rights.
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(News report from Issue No. 184, published on May 14 2014)
MAY 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Temirtau steel plant in central Kazakhstan, owned by Luxembourg-based ArcelorMittal, said that it would make 1,000 workers redundant in order to cut costs.
Outside the energy sector, the Temirtau steel plant is one of Kazakhstan’s biggest industrial operations.
It’s been trying to navigate through a difficult period, though. The combination of sanctions on Iran, previously the factory’s biggest client, and the general global economic weakness combined to knock profits and it has steadily laid off workers over the past couple of years.
At the end of last year, reports surfaced that it would look to cut around 2,500 people from its workforce of about 14,500. This now appears to have been watered down.
There hasn’t been an official statement from the company but state-backed TV channel Astana quoted Dmitry Pavlov, head of human resources at the plant, saying that the work force would be cut by only 1,000 people.
Temirtau is a classic Soviet style monogorod. The plant is the heart and soul of the city and, although the job losses appear to be limited, they will still have a large trickle-down impact.
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(News report from Issue No. 183, published on May 7 2014)
MAY 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s parliament passed an anti-discrimination bill it needed to implement for further integration into the EU but the conservative Orthodox Church has said it will protest against it.
Media reported that Georgia’s parliament passed the law unanimously.
The bill, its supporters and its detractors, give a good insight into the division coursing through Georgian society between modernisers and traditionalists.
The EU, which Georgia is desperate to join, has called on legislation that protects the rights of minorities. This has been generally accepted by Georgians, although the conservative Orthodox Church continues to rile against it.
And the Orthodox Church in Georgia is powerful. Patriarch Ilia II is considered a genuine power-broker, politicians cosy up to religious leaders and priests lead demonstrations. Last year, priests led a march against a gay rights parade that triggered violence. Tolerance in modern day Georgia only goes so far.
For the Church, the new laws are virtually heresy and it has promised to protest against it. Their main difficulty with the law is its protection of homosexuality.
Patriarch Ilia II was succinct. “Not a single believer will accept such law,” he said.
For NGOs pushing for the new legislation it has also been a slight disappointment. They were disappointed that the law finally adopted had been watered down from its original state.
Expect more tension between modernisers and traditionalists.
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(News report from Issue No. 183, published on May 7 2014)
ALMATY/Kazakhstan, APRIL 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — In Kazakhstan’s former capital, the weekend is for parties but, it appears, not everybody is invited.
Down a side street, just off one of the main streets running through Almaty, a group of five or six young men wearing leather jackets smoked cigarettes and shouted insults at the men queuing to enter a gay bar on the opposite side of the road.
The insults grew louder and stronger. Nobody stepped in to stop the abuse.
Being homosexual in Kazakhstan is far from easy. The Soviet legacy of the punishment of buggery and the revival of the strong traditional values of the country’s macho nomadic heritage both play against homosexuality.
This, though, according to a gay rights activist in Almaty goes against the tradition of the city itself.
“Almaty has a history of more than 100 years of mild tolerance towards homosexuality,” the activist who preferred to stay anonymous said in hushed tones below chatter floating across a central Almaty coffee shop.
“During the Tsarist times, Panfilov Park (then Pushkin Park) was used as a pick-up place by Russian men. This was the most gay-friendly city in the whole of Central Asia.”
But now momentum across the former Soviet Union, led by Moscow, has triggered a raft of legislation against homosexuality. Kazakhstan’s lower house of parliament has been holding an ongoing debate on just how to repress homosexuality in society.
A university professor in Almaty described the impact. “There are several professionals who conceal their sexual orientation in the workplace,” he said. Almaty’s former reputation as a tolerant city appears broken.
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(News report from Issue No. 182, published on April 30 2014)
MARCH 25 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — In a similar move to Russia’s controversial law of 2013, Kyrgyzstan’s parliament published a draft bill that would outlaw spreading information about gay issues. The bill is currently only published online for public discussion but this is the first step to turning it into law.
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(News report from Issue No. 178, published on April 2 2014)
MARCH 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Acting as a peacemaker, the Aktobe regional government in north-west Kazakhstan stepped in to mediate in a labour dispute at an oil field operated by China’s state-run energy company CNPC.
The move highlights what appears to be Kazakhstan’s preferred policy when strikes are threatened — to appease labour unions rather than antagonise.
Kazakhstan is desperate to avoid a repeat of an oil workers’ strike in the western oil town of Zhanaozen in 2011 which ended in violence that killed at least 15 people.
Kazakh workers at CNPC AktobeMunaiGas say that they are treated unfairly, paid less and live in worse conditions compared to their Chinese counterparts.
This is a not a new complaint and, although China is a key energy client, Kazakhstan has pushed to improve worker conditions at Chinese companies. And this was no exception.
“The Commission recommended that managers improve the system of remuneration and create conditions for the production in accordance with labour laws,” the Aktobe government said in a statement.
Importantly sources in Aktobe said the threatened strike now appears to be on hold.
CNPC AktobeMunaiGas is one of Kazakhstan biggest oil producers, producing around 6m tonnes each year.
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(News report from Issue No. 175, published on March 12 2014)
JAN. 28 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Human Rights Watch (HRW) released a report accusing police in Kyrgyzstan of deliberately extorting bribes from gay men. The HRW report accused the police of detaining, beating and raping homosexuals. The Kyrgyz authorities denied the allegations.
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(News report from Issue No. 169, published on Jan. 29 2014)
DEC. 30 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — ArcelorMittal will cut hundreds of jobs at its steel plant in Temirtau, central Kazakhstan as it attempts to stem loses from declining global demand.
A Conway Bulletin correspondent in Almaty said the local trade union had estimated that 2,500 jobs would be lost, roughly 17% of the workforce. Although the numbers were not confirmed by ArcelorMittal, the management did agree that jobs would be cut.
Temirtau is a classic monogorod, the Russian term given to cities that survive on one industry, and the job losses will deal a heavy blow economically and psychologically.
The Termirtau steel plant is one of the biggest non-energy projects in the country and also where Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev worked before moving into politics.
In a statement on the company’s website, Vijay Mahadevan, CEO of ArcelorMittal Temirtau, said orders for the company’s products had fallen by 12.5% in the last two years triggering the cuts.
General global demand for steel products remains weak and one of the factory’s key clients, Iran, has been suffering from heavy sanctions that have undermined its economy further.
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(News report from Issue No. 166, published on Jan. 8 2014)
OCT. 9 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Momentum is building inside Kazakhstan’s parliament to pass a law that restricts homosexuals. Homosexuality has been legal since 1998 in Kazakhstan but a handful of lawmakers want to reverse this. Earlier this year Russia banned so-called homosexual propaganda.
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(News report from Issue No. 155, published on Oct. 9 2013)
