Tag Archives: society

Two people dies of anthrax in Kazakhstan

JUNE 21 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Two people died in Karaganda, central Kazakhstan, after an out- break of anthrax poisoning. Local hospitals reported as many as 73 people were being monitored for exposure. Two days after the out- break, Kazakh PM Karim Massimov said the situation is under control. Medical research says Kazakhstan has some of the highest reported human anthrax incidence and mortality rates in the world.

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(News report from Issue No. 286, published on June 24 2016)

Kyrgyz MPs pass media bill

BISHKEK, JUNE 22 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kyrgyzstan’s parliament passed the first reading of a law that will restrict foreign funding of TV channels, a move its proponents have said is vital to protect media integrity but its detractors have said limits freedom.

The bill, which will have to be passed two more times, cuts the share of foreign financing for mass media outlets down to 35% and prohibits any foreign parties from establishing TV channels in Kyrgyzstan.

Media reported that the bill had been passed by 79 votes to 30.

Medet Tiulegenov, a political studies expert, said that the bill may have been pushed through by MPs to feed off popular mistrust of foreigners and boost their profile.

“By promoting a law against foreign investments in local media, MPs are trying to listen to that part of the population, which blames foreigners for problems here,” he said. “There are many MPs, who are not well-known among the population yet, but would like to get attention and popularity.”

This is the second major stand-off in Kyrgyzstan this year between groups of conservative, nationalist MPs and rights campaigners. Earlier this year, at the final reading, parliament rejected a bill that would have banned NGOs from directly receiving foreign funding.

Critics of the bill have said that its main aim was to close down the local office of the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty.

Begaim Usenova, a Kyrgyz media expert, said that this law is another attempt to restrict people’s freedom. “It is incorrect to say that foreign funded media sources are a threat to the state, the bill’s initiators could not prove that there has ever been such a case,” she said.

And the bill appears to have already been watered down after protests by a few dozen people in front of parliament. Restrictions on foreign funding of media were reduced to just TV, rather than including print and radio too.

Still, the bill does carry a degree of popular support in Kyrgyzstan.

Yulia, 33, a Bishkek resident, said: “This is a good law, as every foreigner has its own interests, whereas we have to care about our security.”

And Dauren, 30, another Bishkek resident, said: “I am happy that there are more Kyrgyz patriots in our parliament than western lobbyists.”

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(News report from Issue No. 286, published on June 24 2016)

McDonald’s finally opens in Kazakh city

ALMATY, JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — To much excitement, and a little controversy, McDonald’s opened its first restaurant in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s biggest city.

This is the second McDonald’s in Kazakhstan after a restaurant it opened in Astana in March.

At the opening on the site of an old cinema which heritage activists had campaigned to try and protect, Kairat Boranbayev, owner of the McDonald’s franchise in Kazakhstan and Belarus, said that the company aimed to build a total of 15 stores in Almaty and 10 in Astana.

The long-awaited opening of the McDonald’s restaurants has been one of the few positives for President Nursultan Nazarbayev this year, marked by a sharp drop in Kazakhstan’s economic outlook because of a recession in Russia and a fall in oil prices. Ordinary Kazakhs have seen inflation rise, jobs disappear and tenge savings wiped out.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Georgian anti-LGBT activists want referendum on blocking gay marriages

TBILISI, JUNE 12 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Georgia’s Central Election Committee (CEC) gave preliminary approval for a referendum on enshrining the sanctity of marriage between a man and a woman in the Georgian Constitution, setting up a potentially acrimonious clash between liberals and conservatives.

If activists manage to collect the 200,000 signatures needed to trigger a referendum it is likely that the vote would be held on the same day as a parliamentary election — Oct. 8.

It’ll be closely watched by the European Union. Georgia wants to join the European Union and has been lobbying for visa-free access but, among other issues, Brussels has said that Georgia’s attitude towards gay rights undermines its application.

Georgia’s society is broadly conservative and against gay rights, although it does have a vocal LGBT community. In 2013, a crowd attacked a gay rights march in Tbilisi injuring several people. A Georgian Orthodox priest was photographed wielding a stool as a weapon.

The proposed referendum was put forward by several MPs, including Sandro Bregadze, who had been a deputy minister within the Georgian Dream coalition and is known for his staunchly homophobic comments.

He told a press conference after the CEC approval that the referendum question he wants to put forward is: “Do you agree or not the definition of marriage is a union between a man and a woman for the purpose of starting a family?”

Lika Jalagania, lawyer at Human Rights Education and Monitoring Center, later told The Conway Bulletin that there was a strong chance that the group lobbying for the referendum would be able to collect the 200,000 signatures.

“I really think that they will reach this number, bearing in mind the current homophobic attitudes of Georgian society”, she said.

On June 13, outside the US embassy in Tbilisi a group of gay rights campaigners were holding a vigil in support of the victims of a homophobic attack on a nightclub in Orlando two days earlier. At least 49 people died in the attack, one of the worst mass shootings in the US.

A 57-year-old activist who declined to be named said that mainstream Georgians’ attitude towards the LGBT community would not change.

“The Church rules our country and that is not good for us,” she said.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Violence towards Kazakh TV star sparks debate on violence against women

ALMATY, JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bayan Yessentayeva, a high profile TV celebrity and a role- model for thousands of Kazakh women, was beaten unconscious by her husband during a row at a petrol station, sparking a rare public debate about domestic violence in Kazakhstan.

Eyewitnesses said that Bakhytbek Yessentayev was drunk when he stabbed, punched and kicked Ms Yessentayeva, 42. Mr Yessentayev has a reputation for violence. Earlier this year, a video was posted on Youtube which allegedly showed him punch- ing staff at a casino after he lost thousands of dollars in one evening.

A spokesman for the Talgar hospital near Almaty said that Ms Yessentayeva was unconscious but in a stable condition.

“She’s a very strong woman to be able to survive, especially with such injuries. She has a strong spirit,” said Erbol Sarsenbayev, deputy director of the hospital.

For Kazakhs the beating has generated a rare, and uncomfortable, debate about domestic abuse.

According to the United Nations, 500 women are killed each year by their husbands or boyfriends in Kazakhstan, one of the highest rates per capita in the world.

Campaigners have said that in Kazakhstan a mix of heavy drinking, a distrust of the authorities and Islamic practices which can subjugate women in the home combine to create conditions which heighten scenarios where domestic abuse can occur.

The beating of Ms Yessentayeva, though, triggered a rare protest against domestic violence with women posting photos of their faces on Twitter with painted-on bruises.

Zulfiya Baisakova, chairperson of the activist group Union of Crisis Centers in Kazakhstan, said they receive between 15,000 to 20,000 reports of domestic violence each year.

“Official statistics show that everything is improving but unofficially statistics show an increase in the number of incidences,” she said.

And women in Kazakhstan are frustrated by the lack of attention that domestic abuse receives.

Diana Burkit, a student from south Kazakhstan, told the Conway Bulletin that although she was not a victim of abuse her relatives had been.

“I resent that only after Yessentayeva was abused has anybody paid attention to this. How about what goes on in Shymkent?” she said.

She described domestic violence in southern Kazakhstan as rampant.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

WB approves Kazakhstan road loan

JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The World Bank approved a $978m loan to finance the construction of a road link across Kazakhstan, which will complete the transit corridor between Astana and the west of the country. The project will cost a total of $1b and will be partly funded by the government. The World Bank is also funding part of the Kazakh section of the Western Europe – Western China highway.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Editorial: Azeri sport sponsorship

JUNE 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) -Viewers watching the UEFA European football championships in France will have noticed, it’s impossible not to, SOCAR sponsorship rolling across the advertising hoarding on the side of the pitch.

Even in a recession, SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company, finds the cash to sponsor a major sporting event. This weekend, too, Baku hosts its inaugural Formula 1 Grand Prix. Last summer the city hosted the first European Games.

The total bill for these lavish affairs is likely to run to the billions of dollars. Of course the advertising has raised Azerbaijan’s profile but to what end? SOCAR doesn’t need to become a household name in Europe; athletics and motorsport are hardly integral to the Azerbaijani national character.

Most of these sporting deals would have been organised before the collapse in oil prices that has pressured Azerbaijan’s economy, tipped it into recession and squeezed jobs. Ordinary Azerbaijanis are not having a good time, as shown by nationwide protests earlier this year. Signs of resentment are being more easily picked up.

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(Editorial from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Azerbaijan’s SOCAR becomes EURO sponsor

JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company, is a major sponsor of the UEFA Euro 2016 football tournament currently taking place in France. Neither SOCAR, nor UEFA disclosed the amount paid for the sponsorship, although local media outlets have said it is around 120m manat ($80m).Azerbaijan’s government had previously sponsored Spain’s Atletico Madrid and England’s Sheffield Wednesday.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Chinese company opens hospital near Georgian capital

TBILISI, JUNE 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Hualing Georgia, a private Chinese company, opened a 100-bed hospital near Tbilisi, increasing its commitment to a new urban development and entering the crowded healthcare services market.

The new hospital cost 4.5m lari ($2.1m) to build and is located at the Tbilisi Sea New City, which is being built on the shores of an artificial lake near Georgia’s capital city. Georgian PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili opened the hospital and highlighted the significance of the project.

“This hospital is really an important project for this district. I wish good health to everyone but it’s important to have this type of medical facility close to where you live, and in this district there was no hospital before,” Mr Kvirikashvili said at the inauguration ceremony.

Hualing has invested heavily in Georgia. In October 2015, the company built a new hotel Tbilisi Sea New City. In May, it also said it will build an elevator factory in Kutaisi.

The healthcare sector in Georgia is dominated by London-listed Georgia Healthcare Group (GHG), which controls around 27% of hospital beds. In May, it bought GPC, a drugmaker that controls a 15% share of the pharmaceutical market. BGEO, a holding company that owns Bank of Georgia, owns 65% of GHG.

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)

Azerbaijan readies for first F1 race

JUNE 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan hosts its first Formula 1 Grand Prix in Baku on June 17-19, a race that an estimated 350m people will watch on TV around the world.

President Ilham Aliyev hopes that the race will give Azerbaijan’s profile a major boost, but human rights campaigners are also using it as an opportunity to highlight its poor human rights record.

The newly-built Baku Circuit, a 6km circuit through the city’s historical centre, is fast, allowing cars to hit speeds of up to 340km per hour, making it the fastest street track in the world, according to the organisers.

Spanish driver Fernando Alonso said that it was a unique circuit.

“It’s good both for drivers and in terms of the show for spectators,” he told the formula1.com website.

But in the host city, few Azerbaijanis share his excitement.

With oil prices down, Azerbaijan, which depends on income from oil and gas exports, is predicted to drop into a recession this year.

Official data has not been released but Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty has estimated that the authorities have spent $250m on hosting the F1 race — roughly half the annual healthcare budget.

Locals said the Azerbaijani government should be concentrating on improving the country’s economy.

Bahruz, a 21-year old student in Baku, told the Conway Bulletin’s Azerbaijan correspondent that unemployment has been rising fast.

“Formula 1 is a waste of money. It just serves the government to build an image as a sport-loving country,” he said.

Mr Aliyev appears to have decided to promote Azerbaijan through hosting sports events and sponsoring teams. Azerbaijan had sponsored the team shirt of Atletico Madrid football club, sponsors the European football championship in France and last year hosted the first European Games.

Azerbaijan released several journalists and rights campaigners from prison this year but Rebecca Vincent, head of the Sport for Rights Campaign and a human rights activist said Mr Aliyev was trying to whitewash his government.

“Viewers should not be fooled. The smoke and mirrors distract from a more sinister truth,” she said. “A brutal human rights crackdown taking place behind the scenes.”

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(News report from Issue No. 285, published on June 17 2016)