Tag Archives: society

Armenian hydro snatches market share

MARCH 5 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s overall electricity production was 5.2% higher in January compared to January 2015, mostly due to the sharp increase in hydropower generation.

While traditional sources of power such as thermal and nuclear increased only marginally, production from hydropower and small hydropower stations grew by 23.7%, according to Armenia’s Statistics Committee.

Small hydroelectric plants, in particular, have heavily increased their contribution to Armenia’s total power output.

Small hydropower plants are defined in Armenia as power plants that generate up to 30 MW. In Armenia there are now 173 small hydropower plants, more than twice as many as there were in 2010 and six times more than in 1991. Today, they account for around 9% of the country’s power generation.

Individual entrepreneurs, including many people linked to government officials and ministers, have driven the rise in these small hydro- power stations, building along rivers and generating power which links straight into the national grid.

But while the government has welcomed the rise in small hydro- power stations, anti-corruption campaigners have linked them to money laundering and corruption and environmentalists have said that they are damaging rivers’ eco-systems and creating eye-sores.

“Critics say the plants already in operation are sucking up most of the water in the river system, destroying traditional trout fisheries and depriving area residents of reliable access to water,” Kristine Aghalaryan said in report in the Hetq newspaper.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 271, published on March 11 2016)

Women march through Kyrgyz capital on March 8 to demand more rights

MARCH 8 2016, BISHKEK (The Conway Bulletin) — Dozens of women protested in Bishkek against what they said was the patronising message sent out by the traditional March 8 International Women’s Day celebrations.

The march was a rare challenge to what has become one of the former Soviet area’s most popular and enduring holidays.

“Don’t sell 8th of March for flowers,” the marchers chanted. “We don’t want flowers, we need rights.”

Civic demonstrations, especially by pro-women’s rights groups are rare, if not unheard of, in Central Asia, where governments retain strict control and generally mistrust the rise of women in society.

Kyrgyzstan is something of an exception. It has more political plurality than other countries and counts a woman, Roza Otunbayeva, as a former head of state. She was president of Kyrgyzstan in 2010 and 2011, after a revolution overthrew her successor Kurmanbek Bakiyev. None of the other Central Asian states have had any significant female political or business leadership other than daughters of presidents.

Saadat, one of the march participants, told the Bulletin’s Bishkek correspondent that March 8 was not a holiday to celebrate spring and woman but something much more important.

“Instead of buying flowers and making profit for local flower shops, people would better support women’s crisis centres or female entrepreneurs,” she said.

“I think, one of reason why we were not dispersed on the square (bpolice) is that two female MPs were also with us on the square,” she added.

There is supposedly a quota of women in the Kyrgyz parliament of 30% although activists said the proportion of women in parliament had dropped to 12.4% from 19% in 2004.

Arina Sinovskaya, a member of a Kazakh feminist group, said their rally had been banned in Kazakhstan.

“In Kazakhstan, unfortunately, we cannot hold a march, so we came here to express our solidarity,” she said.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 271, published on March 11 2016)

Editorial: NPLs in Kazakhstan

MARCH 11 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Women banging pots, blowing whistles and wearing grey capes in the streets of Almaty last January alarmed observers.

They were protesting about mortgages and how difficult it was to repay these loans after a devaluation of the tenge. In other words, this was yet another alarm bell about non-performing loans in Kazakhstan.

The country was battered with toxic loans in the aftermath of the Global Financial Crisis of 2007/8 and some banks, directly or indirectly, asked for help from the government.

And the government has only just started to offload these banks — think BTA and Kazkommertsbank’s merger last year.

Now, though, new data suggests that there may be another round of dodgy debt to deal with. This time the government needs to act early to stop borrowers from tipping the fragile banking system into the red again. It has the funds and it now also has the experience. This time round, there are few excuses for the Kazakh government and the Central Bank.

ENDS

(Editorial from Issue No. 271, published on March 11 2016)

China gives up Kazakh prisoners

MARCH 6 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – China handed over four prisoners jailed for drug trafficking over to Kazakhstan, Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reported. The deal, whereby the unnamed prisoners serve out their sentences in Kazakhstan, underlines the close relations between Kazakhstan and China.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 271, published on March 11 2016)

Tajik town renames itself Rakhmonabod after Pres. Rakhmon

MARCH 3 2016, DUSHANBE (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajikistan’s senate approved a request from a small town in the east of the country to be renamed Rakhmonabod, after President Emomali Rakhmon, as a thank you for his prompt aid after a flood in 2015. Villagers of Pitovdasht, in the mountainous Gorno-Badakhsan region, officially applied for the name change last September.

Residents said they wanted this to be a symbol of gratitude for Mr Rakhmon, president of Tajikistan since the mid-1990s, who fulfilled his promise of building 82 new homes after the flooding.

In July 2015, the region was hit hard by floods after glaciers melted and over 10,000 people had to be resettled.

Observers have said the town’s name change lies somewhere between genuine gratitude and the president’s cult of personality.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)

Editorial: Azerbaijani, Kazakh, Georgian civil unrests

MARCH 4 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The economic downturn that has hit Central Asia and the South Caucasus in the past two years has dented people’s purchasing power.

Most people earn salaries in their local currency but these have lost between 50% and 25% of their value in the past months.

This has triggered some social unrest, especially in the South Caucasus. In January, people in Azerbaijan took to the streets to protest against rising food prices and stagnating wages.

The same reasons were voiced by miners in Tkibuli, Georgia, who went on strike for two weeks asking for a 40% increase in salaries. Now reports have emerged from Yerevan where market stall owners briefly scuffled with police over rental prices.

In Central Asia, protests are less frequent and, generally, silenced quickly by the authorities. Last month, however, dozens of Kazakh women banging pots and blowing whistles protested in Almaty about mortgage repayments.

The crisis is starting to bite hard and the people are growing increasingly restless.

ENDS

(Editorial from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)

Turkmenistan unveils Olympic torch

FEB. 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan’s President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov is a keen sportsman.

He loves horse riding and urges Turkmens to keep fit, even declaring April to be the month of “health and happiness”.

And now he has his own sporting mega project to organise — the 2017 Asian Indoor Games which Ashgabat is due to host.

At the latest meeting of the organising committee for the 2017 Games, which state television portrayed as an important step forward in the setup of the event, Mr Berdymukhamedov unveiled the design of the Olympic torch, featuring Turkmenistan’s trademark bright green branding.

Turkmen opposition media, based in Europe and not in Turkmenistan, reported that the Olympic torch for the 2017 Games might be lit at the giant Galkynysh gas field in the south of the country.

It’s still unclear if gundogar.org was making mischief or reporting fact. If it does materialise, it will be another reminder of the importance of gas in the national psyche of Turkmenistan.

And the Games have already attracted controversy. Last year, Amnesty International used satellite imagery to show how several urban clusters on Ashgabat’s fringe were being demolished to make room for the Olympic Village. Turkmen officials didn’t refute the allegations.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)

BP cuts stuff number in Azerbaijan

FEB. 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – British oil company BP laid off 8.5% of its staff in Azerbaijan in 2015, according to a report. The company said it employed 2,992 workers at the end of 2014. In 2015, this number shrunk by 257 people. BP has been hit by the fall in oil prices and is looking to reduce the cost of its operations overseas. Azerbaijan is one of its biggest areas of operations.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)

Russian bank sponsors Georgia’s football team

MARCH 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Georgian subsidiary of Russia’s VTB Bank will sponsor Georgia’s football team, media reported. The deal highlights, once again, just how improved relations are between the two countries. This sort of deal would have been unthinkable only a few years ago. Georgia and Russia fought a brief war over the breakaway state of South Ossetia in 2008.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)

Kazakh foreign travel dries up

MARCH 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The proportion of Kazakhs travelling abroad for holidays or for work has fallen by 70% to 80% because of the devaluation in the tenge, media reported quoting the Kazakhstan Tourist Association chairman Rashid Shaikenov. The tenge has lost around 50% of its value in the past year, forcing people to ditch foreign holidays.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 270, published on March 4 2016)