Tag Archives: society

Tension drops in east Tajikistan

MAY 28 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) -Tension has eased in south-east Tajikistan after officials agreed to launch an investigation into the causes of violence that killed several people a week earlier, media reported. The government’s authority is limited in the region of Gorno-Badakhshan. In 2012, security forces fought pitch battles to control the area after they tried to arrest a local warlord.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 187, published on JUNE 4 2014)

Uzbekistan preens in Potemkin-style

TASHKENT/Uzbekistan, JUNE 4 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — An army of labourers clad in turquoise overalls swarmed over the Uzbek capital, intent on sprucing up the centre of this leafy city. The Latvian president was coming to town, and every blade of grass had to be in its right place.

Shielding their faces from a fierce sun, workers crouched on the grass, studiously weeding it by hand. More labourers were busy with the apparently fruitless task of hosing down the walls of the Ankhor Canal, which winds languidly through the capital behind the shiny civic buildings on Independence Square.

Heaven forbid that the visitor, Andris Berzins, should peer out of his motorcade and spot a flower out of place or a lingering spot of dust. It seemed that his host, Islam Karimov, could never live it down.

The grandiose Palace of Forums, the white marble monster that was due to be the venue for their summit, gleamed in the sunlight. There were no people strolling past the statue of the national hero, Tamurlane, in the park in front of the palace as the whole area had been closed off. Independence Square was also off limits. Hordes of green-uniformed police officers manned the perimeter, whistling officiously and shooing away any unsuspecting member of the public who dared approach.

In Uzbekistan, image is everything and when a European leader visits, its authoritarian ruler pulls out the stops to impress. It is a rare event. Few international leaders drop by since a photo call with Mr Karimov, vilified in the West as a dictator and serial human rights abuser, is tantamount to political suicide.

So the Latvian president’s arrival in Tashkent is important and yet dissenters mutter that all this Potemkin-style preening will do nothing to improve Uzbekistan’s pariah status.

Armenia to raise electricity prices

JUNE 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s government is considering increasing electricity prices for the second year running.

Ara Simonyan, deputy minister for energy, made the omission after questions from parliamentarians who were trying to find out whether rumours of a price increase had any substance.

“The electricity tariffs are not frozen in Armenia and shall be reviewed from time to time. There is no certain decision at the moment,” he said.

Last year the state’s body for regulating electricity prices raised the cost of a kilowatt hour to 38 drams from 30 drams. Now, media has reported, the government is considering putting up prices by another 20% to around 45 drams.

This is important because rising utility prices stirs anger.

Armenians have already vented their frustration this year against proposed changes to the pension system, triggering the downfall of one government. The new government has said that it will look again at the proposed changes which would have meant that people have to put 5% of their income towards their state pension.

Mr Simonyan said hydroelectric stations were unusually dry last year meaning that less electricity was generated and that this meant prices had to rise.

Regardless, if the government does take the decision to increase electricity prices, it could generate public resentment.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 187, published on JUNE 4 2014)

Tajiks debate conscription

JUNE 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) -In Tajikistan, where military service is compulsory, a debate is brewing about violence in the armed forces. The outcome of a high-profile trial may impact how President Emomali Rakhmon will react.

The trial revolves around 20-year-old border guard Shakhbol Mirzoyev who was seriously injured after, allegedly, being beaten up by fellow soldiers on March 6.

Tajikistan’s Asia-Plus news service reported that Mr Mirzoyev’s had his leg and neck broken.

The republic’s main opposition party the Islamic Renaissance Party of Tajikistan has since called for changes to the law on forced military conscription and the elimination of the practice of oblava which sees unwilling conscripts effectively kidnapped into armed service.

A period of hazing — physical and psychological intimidation that is part of most armies across the former Soviet Union — often follows such kidnappings.

Many young Tajiks flee abroad to dodge conscription.

Malik, a 23-year old Tajik national who graduated from university in Bishkek says he isn’t going home this summer.

“My [Tajik] friends in Kyrgyzstan here have all paid the army off, so they are safe,” he said. “But I am here on a scholarship and my family don’t have money. If they find me, I will have to serve.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 187, published on JUNE 4 2014)

Abkhaz protesters storm presidential administration in Georgia

MAY 27 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) -Protesters stormed the presidential administration in the Georgian rebel region of Abkhazia, forcing Aleksandr Ankvab, its leader, to flee. Protesters said they were frustrated with corruption. Mr Ankvab later denounced their action as a coup attempt. Russia has supported Abkhazian independence from Georgia since a 2008 war.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 186, published on May 28 2014)

Tajik military strikes cause protests

MAY 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan’s restive southeast is threatening to boil over again after a special forces operation near Khorog, capital of Gorno-Badakhshan region, led to four deaths and a week of protests.

The deaths and the subsequent protests underline the difficulty that Tajik president Emomali Rakhmon has in imposing central government will on this restive part of the country.

The target of the operation was given as drug traffickers. That, though, may have been a euphemism for a local anti-government warlord.

The special forces operation killed two people in broad daylight and injured several others, angering locals who then protested and tried to storm the security forces headquarters. Reports said that two protesters were killed and more injured when security forces fired on the crowd.

The whole operation is reminiscent of a security operation in the same area two years ago. Back then, the army had to virtually close off the area and engage in street to street fighting with rebels. Dushanbe may have committed another blunder in a part of the country where its authority has been limited ever since a civil war in the 1990s.

Gorno-Badakhshan, whose population backed the ill-fated United Tajik Opposition in that conflict, is a hub of anti-government resentment.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 186, published on May 28 2014)

Ex-Kyrgyz President begged for help

MAY 22 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – In an interview with Russian TV, Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko described how former Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev phoned him from a forest in southern Kyrgyzstan in 2010 after fleeing protesters and begged him for help. Mr Lukashenko gave Mr Bakiyev residence in Belarus.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 186, published on May 28 2014)

Russia’s Crimea grab impacts north Kazakhstan

PAVLODAR/Kazakhstan, MAY 28 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Vitaly couldn’t get his words out fast enough. His jowly cheeks seemed to wobble with enthusiasm.

“Yes, if Putin did say that he wanted northern Kazakhstan we would support it,” he said. Putin was a reference, of course, to Russian president Vladimir Putin.

His friend shot him a quick look and interjected.

“But we’re happy to be part of Kazakhstan too. This is our home,” he said, shoving his hands into his tracksuit trousers. “Pavlodar is a comfortable place to live.”

The men, who were in their mid-20s, were standing on a scruffy street near the centre of this city of 330,000 people in northern Kazakhstan. It was built by the Russian empire on the banks of the serene Irtysh River which flows more than 4,000km from western Kazakhstan, into Russia’s Siberia and the Ob river system that eventually disgorges into the Arctic Sea.

From Pavlodar, the Russian border is barely 100km away.

Since Russia annexed Crimea from Ukraine in March, attention in Kazakhstan has focused on its northern regions. Here ethnic Russians outnumber Kazakhs and Russian, not Kazakh, is the main language spoken. Firebrand Russian politicians have urged Putin to turn it into Russia.

Pavlodar feels harmonious but there is an underlying tension that is not hard to find. And it worries people.

Anara, an ethnic Kazakh lawyer, was walking home from work along one of Pavlodar’s wide, tree-lined streets.

“People have always lived well together but after Crimea people are talking about it. What happens if Putin decides he wants to take northern Kazakhstan?” she said. “In Pavlodar and Petropavlovsk the main language is Russian. He could do it.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 186, published on May 28 2014)

Kazakhstanis protest against Eurasian Union

MAY 27 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Police in Astana detained 20 people demonstrating against the proposed Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), two days before Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan planned to sign it into existence. The EEU is designed to replace the Customs Union. Some analysts have said that it will morph from an economic club into a political group.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 186, published on May 28 2014)

Armenia commemorates genocide

MAY 27 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Throwing the gauntlet down to his Turkish counterpart, Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan invited Turkey’s president to commemorate the 100th anniversary of what Armenia calls the genocide of its people by Ottoman Turks next year. Turkey denies the charges and instead says people were killed during inter-ethnic fighting.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 186, published on May 28 2014)