NOV. 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan intends to build a database holding fingerprints for all its citizens by 2021, media reported quoting the interior ministry. Deputy interior minister Rashid Zhakupov said that the project will cost 36.8b tenge ($107 million) and is designed to speed up border controls. The initiative should also tighten security across the country.
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(News report from Issue No. 305, published on Nov. 18 2016)
NOV. 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Russian government sent an official protest note to Georgia over Georgian-NATO military exercises which it described as a serious threat to peace and stability in the region. NATO keeps a permanent training base in Georgia. Both NATO and Georgia shrugged off the Russian complaint and said they were not aimed at Russia. Georgia wants to join NATO.
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(News report from Issue No. 305, published on Nov. 18 2016)
NOV. 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s parliament has approved a new law that will pay out cash rewards to people who give information to the security services which prevents attacks by Islamic extremists, media reported. Kazakhstan has been increasingly worried about the rise in attacks that it attributes to Islamic extremists.
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(News report from Issue No. 305, published on Nov. 18 2016)
NOV. 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Baku jailed seven men for fighting for the radical IS group in Syria. Countries in Central Asia and the South Caucasus have been fighting to contain a recruitment drive by IS in the region. The men were jailed for between 2-1/2 and 14 years. They had been arrested once they returned home from fighting with IS.
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(News report from Issue No. 305, published on Nov. 18 2016)
NOV. 11 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyzstan released 1,277 inmates from its prisons in an amnesty designated to celebrate both the 25th anniversary of independence from the Soviet Union and also the 100th anniversary of an uprising against imperial tsarist forces. The pan-Central Asia rebellion of 1916 was triggered by a decree from the Tsar to mobilise men to fight for Russian forces in the First World War. Russian soldiers repressed the rebellion within a year, killing thousands of people. Different governments have interpreted the uprisings through different lenses. The Soviet Union saw the uprisings as a class struggle. The newly independent countries of Central Asia frame them as national-liberation movements.
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(News report from Issue No. 305, published on Nov. 18 2016)
NOV. 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Uzbek and Kyrgyz officials met in Ferghana City, Uzbekistan, to agree resolutions to seven more border dispute areas, the 24.kg news website reported. The border resolution process is part of a drive by Uzbekistan since the death of Islam Karimov in September to repair damaged relations with its neighbours. 24.kg reported that the Kyrgyz-Uzbek border was 1,378km long and that nearly a third of this has been disputed.
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(News report from Issue No. 305, published on Nov. 18 2016)
ALMATY, NOV. 8 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A closed court in Astana sentenced Tokhtar Tuleshov, the self- styled beer king of southern Kazakhstan, to 21 years in prison for attempting to stage a coup against Kazakh leader Nursultan Nazarbayev.
Prosecutors had said that Tuleshov had financed a series of anti- government protests in April and May that focused on land ownership. The breadth of the protests and their leaderless nature unnerved Mr Nazarbayev. Police arrested the protest organisers and charged Tuleshov, detained in January for unrelated charges of illegally owning weapons and fraud, with financing the demonstrations.
Tuleshov made his millions through the Shymkentpivo brewery, one of the biggest in Kazakhstan, in the southern city of Shymkent.
His supporters say that he has been framed and point out that it is not possible for him to have paid for the protests from prison.
An ostentatious and dapper figure, Tuleshov used to drive through the scruffy streets of Shymkent in a chauffeured Rolls Royce. Birthday parties for his daughter were lavish affairs with pop stars flown in to sing and guests dressing up in outlandish fancy dress.
The trial was held behind closed doors with journalists only allowed into the courtroom for the final verdict. Human rights activists have said that the arbitrary and closed nature of the trial worried them and could set a precedent.
Analysts have also speculated that Mr Nazarbayev and other senior members of the government from the central and northern tribes in Kazakhstan used Tuleshov to send a warning to high-ranking members of the southern tribe not to challenge their dominance.
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(News report from Issue No. 304, published on Nov. 11 2016)
NOV. 9 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A senior Afghan army commander in the north of Afghanistan said that the Taliban was encouraging Uzbek and Tajik radical militants to infiltrate Central Asia. The Pajhwork reported that Lt. Gen. Sher Aziz Kamawal had said that the Taliban was using instability in Kunduz region, on the border with Uzbekistan, as a launchpad for militants to move into Central Asia. Governments in Central Asia have been increasingly concerned about Taliban encroachment north.
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(News report from Issue No. 304, published on Nov. 11 2016)
NOV. 7 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Georgia’s new defence minister, Levan Izoria, has said that he may reverse a decision by his predecessor to scrap military conscription next year, media reported. Georgia announced in June that it was going to scrap conscription, part of a drive to professionalise its military. It wants to join NATO and has sent its forces to Afghanistan and Iraq. By regional standards, Georgia’s army already looks and feels like a Western army. Only non- combat roles are filled with conscripts. Media reported that Mr Izoria had said that conscription was useful in helping ethnic minorities integrate.
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(News report from Issue No. 304, published on Nov. 11 2016)
NOV. 4 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenia and Georgia unveiled a new border crossing at Bagratashen and renewed vows to boost bilateral cooperation. At the inauguration ceremony, Georgian PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili met Armenian President Serzh Sargsyan and stressed the importance of improved regional cooperation.
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(News report from Issue No. 304, published on Nov. 11 2016)
