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Georgia moves towards EU visa-free entry treaty

DEC. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The European Commission said that Georgia had passed its benchmark test required for it to be eligible for a visa-free treaty with the EU, a major step towards the Georgian government’s key foreign policy objective of integrating more closely with the West.

It’s now expected that the European Parliament will vote sometime in the first half of next year on whether to formally allow Georgians visa-free entry to the Schengen region.

The Schengen region is named after the town in Luxembourg where EU members states struck a deal to ease travel requirements. Britain and Ireland, both EU members, declined to sign up to the deal. Norway, Ice- land, Switzerland and Liechtenstein are non-EU members who have signed up to the agreement.

And Georgia’s leaders appeared confident the European Parliament would vote to allow them easier access to Europe.

PM Irakli Garibashvili called it a historic day.

“Our country has confirmed once again that we are frontrunners among EU’s Eastern Partnership countries,” he said. “In response, Europe tells us that it is open for Georgian citizens.”

If the European Parliament did vote to allow Georgians visa-free entry it could irritate Russia which is sensitive about former Soviet states moving towards the West.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Kyrgyzstan reveals gold corruption

DEC. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Bishkek sentenced Dilger Zhaparov, head of the state-owned gold miner Kyrgyzaltyn, to three years in jail because of an unauthorised payment he made to Centerra Gold. Centerra Gold has denied any wrongdoing.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Turkey/Azerbaijan/Georgia defence ministers meet

DEC. 17 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Defence ministers from Turkey, Azerbaijan and Georgia met up in Istanbul for their regular twice yearly meeting. Although no policy statements were made the meeting is significant for its timing. Turkey is looking for allies to bolster it in its row with Russia, triggered when one of its warplanes shot down a Russian fighter-jet over Syria last month.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Sweden jails Uzbek hitman

DEC. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A Swedish court sentenced Yury Zhukovsky, an Uzbek national, to 18 years in prison for the attempted murder of dissident Obid-kori Nazarov in February 2012, in a case that intensified attention on Uzbekistan’s human rights record.

The prosecutor in the trial accused the Uzbek government of ordering the murder of Mr Nazarov who had fled Uzbekistan to Sweden in 2006. He had been a popular cleric who preached against the government.

The judge, though, said that it was not possible to rule on who may have ordered the murder.

Zhukovsky was caught on CCTV camera in a shop in the remote northern town of Stromsund hours before Mr Nazarov was shot in the head with a revolver. Mr Nazarov survived the attempted murder but has been left with brain damage.

Human rights groups have criticised Uzbekistan record. They have said that the government pursues its enemies abroad.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

China buys controlling stake in major Kazmunaigas subsidiary

DEC. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — China’s CEFC energy company will buy a controlling stake in KMG Inter- national, a subsidiary of Kazmunaigas, in a deal that helps Kazakhstan raise cash but also rids Western investors of one of the more interesting companies previously offered up by Kazakh officials as a potential IPO target.

The deal, which will give CEFC a 51% share in the Netherlands-based company, is valued at between $500m and $1b, sources told Reuters.

KMG International, formerly called Rompetrol, owns the Petromidia Navodari refinery and hundreds of petrol stations in Romania, Georgia, Bulgaria and Moldova.

It is affiliated with Switzerland- based KMG Trading, which secured a $3b deal in December with Vitol as the buyer of future oil shipments from Kazmunaigas’ 20% share of the Tengizchevroil consortium.

Neither KMG International nor KMG Trading could be reached for comment.

Kazmunaigas has unsuccessfully tried to sell off Rompetrol-owned assets over the past few years.

Samruk-Kazyna, Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund which owns Kazmunaigas, had said it wanted to sell KMG International in a round of privatisation set for 2016. Now, the privatisation of KMG International seems to have fallen out of this IPO bucket list.

Kazakhstan has said it wants to sell off state-owned companies involved in midstream and downstream operations in an effort to raise much-needed cash to restore financial stability during what has become a sustained downturn in oil prices.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Cash flow to Tajikistan falls

DEC. 17 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Remittances from Russia to Tajikistan were 73.5% lower in the third quarter of this year compared to the same period in 2014, data from the Russian Central Bank showed. The data shows just how heavily a recession in Russia is impacting people in Central Asia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Azerbaijan extinguishes Caspian Sea fire

DEC. 17 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The authorities in Azerbaijan said they had finally extinguished the fire at Platform No. 10 of the Guneshli shallow water oil rig off the coast of Baku, nearly two weeks after a storm smashed into it causing an explosion in a gas pipe.

Emergency crews also said they had received permission to search for the bodies of 26 missing oil workers from other littoral states bordering the Caspian Sea.

Three workers from the Oil Rocks platform and 23 workers from the Guneshli platform are still listed as missing.

Rescue teams have already found the bodies of seven workers killed in the fire on Dec. 4.

A final death toll of 33 would make it the worst offshore oil platform accident since the Piper Alpha disaster in 1988 when 167 people were killed.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Low oil prices collapse current account surplus in Azerbaijan

DEC. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan’s Central Bank released data that showed a massive drop in its current account surplus for January-September 2015 because of sustained low oil prices.

For the first three quarters of the year, the trade balance totalled $240.5m, down from $9.1b in the same period last year, showing the impact of low oil prices and currency depreciation.

Azerbaijan has run a current account surplus since 2005.

For the Jan.-Sept. period, the Central Bank used an average price of oil of $51/barrel, while last year the price level was set at $102/barrel. The Azerbaijani Central Bank devalued its currency by a third in February.

In particular, the balance of trade in the oil and gas sector was $5.4b, down from $15.1b compared to last year. This is important because oil and gas is a major earner for Azerbaijan.

Still, it could be worse. Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan’s oil exporting neighbour across the Caspian Sea, recorded a deficit in the first three quarters of the year having posted a surplus in 2014.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Germany leaves UZ base

DEC. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The German military closed its base at Termez, Uzbekistan, near the border with Afghanistan. Rent costs for the base had increased to €16m ($17.3m) per year, up from €2.9m ($3.15m) per year in 2002. Germany had used the base as part of a logistics route into Afghanistan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)

Former Kazakh PM sent to prison for corruption

DEC. 11 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Karaganda sentenced former Kazakh PM Serik Akhmetov to 10 years in prison on corruption charges, completing the downfall of a former high-flying member of Kaza- khstan’s inner clique of elite.

Akhmetov was sentenced alongside other 20 senior officials, among them the former governor of the Karaganda region, Baurzhan Abishev, and former mayor of the
city, Meiram Smagulov.

They were all charged with abuse of office and embezzlement.

The trial effectively disbands the former group of Karaganda elite and acts as a warning for other local elites in Kazakhstan.

Akhmetov, 57, had served as PM from September 2012 to April 2014, when he was removed and replaced by his predecessor Karim Massimov.

He was then appointed defence minister, but was sacked in October 2014, just one month before prosecutors filed corruption charges against him.

Now, in his latest ignominy, he will going to jail for taking a $2.4m bribe.

Days before his sentence, Akhmetov publicly admitted his errors and asked President Nursultan

Nazarbayev for forgiveness.
“I sincerely apologise to Nursultan Abishevich for not repaying his trust and causing him distress,” said Akhmetov. The court displayed little clemency towards Akhmetov, instead pre- ferring to hand him a heavy sentence and use him as an example to others.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)