Author Archives: admin

IMF forecasts Kazakh economy

MAY 24 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Christine Lagarde, managing director of the IMF, said that Kazakhstan has to embark on a series of institutional reforms and deepen regional integration to face the challenges posed by sustained low oil prices. Ms Lagarde spoke from Astana, where she met President Nursultan Nazarbayev and senior government officials. Ms Lagarde also praised the ditching of the tenge’s US dollar peg last year.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Kazakh minister says Tengiz expansion will be delayed

MAY 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s energy minister Kanat Bozumbayev said that investment into the expansion of Tengizchevroil, the Chevron-led consortium exploiting the Tengiz oilfield in the west of the country, will be delayed until next year. Mr Bozumbayev said that costs for the so-called Future Growth Project would be $37b, up from an earlier estimate of $34b. The project has been delayed because of the low oil prices.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Azerbaijan’s railway signs agreement with DHL

MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s state-owned railway company signed an agreement with German logistics giant DHL to establish a hub in Azerbaijan to service Turkey, Russia and Europe with goods coming from China. Azerbaijan Railways’ representative Nadir Azmammadov met with a DHL delegation in Istanbul.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Kazakh President’s brother buys bank

MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bolat Nazarbayev, brother of Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev, bought a 50% stake in the Ukrainian lender Eurobank. The remaining 50% of the bank is indirectly owned by Ukrainian financier Vadim Pushkarev. In 2014, Bolat Nazarbayev bought a 7.83% stake in Kazakhstan’s Bank RBK.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Journalists in Kazakhstan go on strike

MAY 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Journalists at Kazinform, the Kazakh government’s media outlet, said they would go on a strike on May 21 because of wage arrears, but later called it off. Importantly, strikes at Kazinform are rare. The last recorded strike was in 2010. May 21 was a sensitive date as a popular protest against changes to the land code was planned on the same day. The government stepped in and met the demands of Kazinform journalists.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Chinese leader to visit Azerbaijan

MAY 22/23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Chinese President Xi Jingping will make his first visit to Azerbaijan later this year, a major boost for Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev who has appeared an increasingly fringe figure on the international stage after the arrests of dozens of critics and the outbreak of violence in the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.

Six months after Mr Aliyev visited Beijing, a delegation from China, led by Presidential Special Envoy Meng Jianzhu, arrived in Baku to prepare the way for Mr Xi.

It will be his first visit to the South Caucasus, underlining China’s interest in the region.

During the meeting with President Aliyev on May 22, Mr Meng reiterated his country’s interest to expand ties with Azerbaijan, particularly in law enforcement, security and cyber crime. The following day, Azerbaijan and China signed a memorandum of cooperation in the security sector.

Zohrab Ismayilov, an Azerbaijani independent economist and analyst, told the Conway Bulletin that Mr Aliyev has grown increasingly interested in China as Azerbaijan’s economy has been hard hit following the sharp drop in oil prices.

“Mr Aliyev is trying to find a third reliable partner and continues to manoeuvre between Russia and the West,” he said.

“Also, the government assumes that Chinese investments will be politically less risky than investments from Moscow or the West as Beijing does not have a strong geopolitical interest in the region.”

China became one of Azerbaijan’s top ten trading partners for the first time in 2015 with trade worth $565m. This compares to $2.8b of trade with Russia, its top partner.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Azerbaijan frees Ismayilova

MAY 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The Supreme Court in Azerbaijan unexpectedly freed investigative journalist Khadija Ismayilova from prison, marking a major victory for human rights and free speech activists.

Ms Ismayilova was the most high- profile journalist imprisoned in Azerbaijan over the last few years in a crackdown by the authorities on the media and opposition activists. She had worked for the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, hosted a popular radio programme and reported on corruption allegations against President Ilham Aliyev.

The Supreme Court scrapped charges against Ms Ismayilova for misappropriation of property and abuse of power but upheld other charges of tax evasion and illegal entrepreneurship. Importantly it reduced the original sentence of 7-1⁄2 years handed down in September 2015 to a 3-1⁄2 year suspended sentence. Ms Ismayilova had been arrested and imprisoned since December 2014.

Wearing a huge smile, Ms Ismayilova emerged from her prison in Baku, to face the media. She was as defiant as ever.

“My arrest was solely for political reasons as President Aliyev and his clique wanted to get rid of any criticism against them,” she said.

Later, in an interview with RFE/RL, Ms Ismayilova said that she would continue to work as an investigative journalist. The authorities, though, have said that Ms Ismayilova is not allowed to work as a journalist during her suspended sentence.

The Azerbaijani authorities appear to have had a change of heart regarding dozens of activists they have arrested over the past few years. They allowed human rights activists Arif and Leyla Yunus to leave the country earlier this month and in March gave amnesty to a dozen or so activists.

An economic downturn, triggered by a collapse in oil prices has hit Azerbaijan hard. Observers said the authorities in Azerbaijan may have decided to back down over the West’s demands to relax their hardline approach in favour of improved ties.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Kazakhstan receives loan from EBRD

MAY 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The EBRD has loaned around €294m ($328m) to KazTransGas, Kazakhstan’s state-owned gas distributor, to finance the modernisation of a gas storage facility and a distribution network. This is the first time that the EBRD has invested into KazTransGas projects. Modernisation at the Bozoi gas storage facility, near the Aral Sea, will increase its capacity by 1.5 times to 4b cubic metres.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Lukoil improves ties with Uzbekistan

MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Russian energy company Lukoil said it had reached an agreement with the Uzbek government to improve the terms of its production sharing agreement (PSA) for the development of its oil fields at Kandym, Khauzak, Shady and Kungrad. Details of the new PSA were kept confidential. Lukoil had said that sustained low oil prices had made these projects more costly.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Court in Kazakhstan imprisons critical journalist

ALMATY, MAY 23 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Almaty sentenced Guzyal Baidalinova, owner and editor of the Nakanune.kz website which is critical of the Kazakh government, to 1-1⁄2 years in jail for libel against Kazkommertsbank.

Baidalinova’s supporters said that the charges against her are politically motivated and show that the authorities in Kazakhstan have little regard for freedom of the press. In a separate case, charges against Seitkazy Matayev, head of the Journalists Union and a former press chief for President Nursultan Nazarbayev were reduced from embezzlement and tax evasion to abuse of trust. He has denied the charges.

The authorities in Kazakhstan have been cracking down on journalists as an economic downturn worsens and ordinary Kazakhs start become increasingly frustrated with their plight.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)