MARCH 31 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan’s Hydrological Agency warned that significantly less snow in its Pamir mountains this year will lead to lower water levels for downstream Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan, media reported. Arguments over water supplies are a major source of tension in Central Asia.
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(News report from Issue No. 34, published on April 4 2011)
MARCH 24 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – A document released by the German parliament showed Germany had paid Uzbekistan for the use of a military base while EU sanctions were imposed in 2005-9. The EU imposed sanctions after Uzbek soldiers killed protesters in 2005. Germany had rented the base since 2002. Rights groups have said the West places strategic interests above human rights in Central Asia.
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(News report from Issue No. 33, published on March 28 2011)
MARCH 15 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Further isolating its population, Uzbekistan closed the office of New York-based Human Rights Watch (March 15) and blocked access to the website of London’s Institute for War and Peace Reporting (March 11). Uzbekistan had already banned most foreign news groups and NGOs.
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(News report from Issue No. 32, published on March 21 2011)
MARCH 17 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Defence ministers from the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO) member states — Russia, China, Kazakhstan, Tajikistan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan — met in Astana to coordinate policy until 2013. The SCO, a military and economic group, has increased its activities over the last few years and some analysts have even referred to it as a potential counterbalance to NATO.
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(News report from Issue No. 32, published on March 21 2011)
MARCH 10 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Masked police raided several Turkish businesses in Tashkent including one of the city’s biggest supermarket Turkuaz, media reported. The authorities said the businesses were fronts for Islamic extremism, accusations the businesses deny. The raids follow similar action against Turkish business in December and may be part of turf war.
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(News report from Issue No. 31, published on March 14 2011)
MARCH 14 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Nukus, an impoverished town on the western edge of the Karakum desert in Uzbekistan, is an unlikely place for one of the world’s finest collections of Russian avant-garde art. But this was where Igor Savitsky stashed banned paintings by artists the Soviet Union had sent to the gulags.
Savitsky lived in Nukus and used the town’s obscurity to hide the art in the 1950s and 1960s. By the time embarrassed local Communist officials discovered the 38,000 piece collection later it was too late. Savitsky had built up what an art critic described as “a treasure trove of art historical surprises”.
Now a documentary entitled “The Desert of Forbidden Art” about the collection has premiered in New York (March 11). The trailer can be viewed at www.desertofforbiddenart.com.
In May 2003, the editor of this newsletter visited the Savitsky Museum in Nukus. In an interview, Marinika Babanazarova, its director, described the subversive nature of the collection.
“He used his personal contacts, charm and eloquence to collect the paintings,” she said according to notes. “It became a sort of underground network as the artists or their relatives would offer him paintings because they knew he would preserve them. He was trusted.”
Perhaps this is why the Uzbek authorities appear less than impressed by the international attention the collection has generated recently. Media reported that they barred Ms Babanazarova from flying to Washington for a screening. Uzbek officials have not commented.
For Uzbekistan, it appears, Savitsky’s painting collection has retained its subversive edge.
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(News report from Issue No. 31, published on March 14 2011)
MARCH 3 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – London-listed Oxus Gold said it doubted auditors would give a fair valuation to the 50% share of a gold mine it had agreed to sell to the Uzbek government. Oxus said it was prepared to trigger a legal battle with the Uzbek government over the value of the stake. Its shares fell 50%.
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(News report from Issue No. 30, published on March 7 2011)
MARCH 3 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Constitutional amendments appear in vogue in Central Asia and the South Caucasus.
Georgia fiddled with its Constitution to shift power to the PM from the president in 2013, just as Mikhail Saakashvili leaves the presidency, and Kazakhstan nearly amended its constitution through a referendum to extend President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s term in office until 2020.
Now the lower house of Uzbekistan’s parliament has passed President Islam Karimov’s ideas for constitutional amendments. For the amendments to become law, the Senate needs to approve them.
Hailed by lawmakers as step forward for democracy, the amendments will mean that parliament nominates the PM and can also trigger a vote of no confidence in the premier.
But as Mr Karimov has ruled Uzbekistan since 1989 and parliament rubber stamps his decisions, analysts said these changes were aimed at appeasing the West rather than spreading real democracy.
Perhaps the more important amendment is the specification that if the President is unable to perform his duties, power shifts to the speaker of the Senate. Currently, the constitution states that parliament should elect a temporary leader followed by an election within three months.
Observers said this amendment may have been designed to both smooth a transition of power from the 73-year-old Mr Karimov and sideline potential rivals. The current head of the senate is the largely unknown 52-year-old Ilgizar Sobirov, who is leader of a small Uzbek region.
The information flow from Uzbekistan is light but these constitutional amendments do indicate that the political landscape is shifting.
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(News report from Issue No. 30, published on March 7 2011)
MARCH 5 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbekistan’s lower house of parliament voted to amend the country’s Constitution and devolve some power from the president to Parliament. The amendments also stated that if the president becomes incapable of running the country then power passes to the head of the Senate, Parliament’s upper chamber.
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(News report from Issue No. 30, published on March 7 2011)
MARCH 1 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Hundreds of Kyrgyz torched the house of an Uzbek they accused of organising the murder of a local official, media reported. The attack in a town near Osh in the south of Kyrgyzstan roused fears of a repeat of ethnic violence that killed 400 people in June 2010.
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(News report from Issue No. 30, published on March 7 2011)
