OCT. 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s Agency for Renewable Energy said it is developing a 200 megawatt wind farm in the Caspian Sea, to help diversify the country’s energy supply. The project will cost around 450-500m manat (around $450m). Azerbaijan, which has only minor renewable energy production, wants to reach a capacity of 2 gigawatt by the end of the decade.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
NOV. 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Almaty-based Eurasian Development Bank is close to agreeing a deal to lend the Armenian government $300m to help it through the economic malaise enveloping the Central Asia and South Caucasus region.
If it is agreed, the first $100m is due at the end of this year with the outstanding $200m handed over by the end of 2017.
Like other countries in Central Asia and the South Caucasus, Armenia has been trying to deal with the fallout of the drop in oil prices and a recession in Russia which have combined to tip the entire region into an economic depression.
“Current macroeconomic actions have been agreed with the Armenian government,” Dmitry Pankin, the EDB CEO, told the Armenpress news agency.
“The project has been approved by the expert council and is now being considered by the Eurasian Stabilisation and Development Fund. After the official decision, the final conditions will be agreed upon.”
The Eurasian Development Bank is an overtly political organisation. It’s membership mirrors the membership of the Kremlin-led Eurasian Economic Union — Russia, Kazakhstan, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan and Armenia — with the addition of Tajikistan.
It was set up before the Eurasian Economic Union to give the trade bloc extra weight.
It also acts as a kind of sweetener. Armenia is reliant on Russia for economic and political support. It joined the Eurasian Economic Union at the start of this year under duress from Russia but can now access cheap loans to keep its economy running.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
NOV. 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenian authorities lifted a ban on imports of poultry meat and by-products from three US states — Nebraska, South Dakota and Wisconsin. In May, Armenia’s Food Safety Service had banned poultry imports from 13 US states, following an outbreak of avian influenza in the US. Armenia lifted the ban for 10 US states in July.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
OCT. 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative (EITI), an intergovernmental organisation set up to improve transparency in mining and oil sectors, published its first report on Tajikistan which the authors said shone some light on the murky Tajik extractive sector.
Anti-corruption lobby groups have previously criticised the Tajik government for siphoning off cash from its metals sector and while the report was considered a step forward for transparency in Tajikistan, there were still many blank spots.
And the authors of the report made this clear.
“Three of the 14 companies in the EITI Report are partially state owned. Considerable details related to these companies are missing from the report due to the currently weak government systems for recording all company payments,” they wrote in the EITI report.
Tajikistan had been supposed to present its first report to the EITI in February, a deadline it missed.
A presentation on the report will be made in Dushanbe on Nov. 25.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
NOV. 6 2015, BISHKEK (The Conway Bulletin)– Famed across the Soviet Union as the biggest and most beautiful of Central Asia’s formal gardens, the Botanical Garden in Bishkek is now, quite literally, dying.
Once a peaceful sanctuary of bright exotic flowers and their perfumed scents, the 152 hectare Botanical Garden is overgrown and decrepit.
There are few visitors and even fewer staff. Most left in the 1990s when the Soviet Union collapsed, dragging down people’s salaries too. Now just a handful of under-paid scientists tend to the garden.
A weather-beaten Dmitry Vetoshkin, was one of these.
“For such a small city as Bishkek having a Botanical Garden is a luxury,” he said. But it’s a luxury that is under increased threat.
Kyrgyzstan’s capital is growing and has swallowed up the Botanical Garden. It once lay on the southeast fringe
of the city. Now, it is ringed by busy road and houses. Property developers are pinching parcels of land to build houses and gardens.
But for most people, the political elite included, the fate of the Botanical Garden is of little concern. “While political parties promise to improve people’s lives during current election campaign, none of them
announced a course to take up and renovate our natural heritage, our Botanical Garden, that stands at the entrance of the city,” said Vetoshkin.
Kyrgyzstan held a parliamentary election on Oct. 4.
There has though, despite the lack of support from the political elite, been some sort of grassroots resistance against selling off or giving away the Botanical Garden to developers. Vetoshkin said citizen power helped to defeat a proposal from developers to build new greenhouses in exchange for taking a large slice of the garden to develop.
Even so, the reprieve may just be temporary. It’s difficult to see just where the Botanical Garden fits into modern Bishkek life.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
NOV. 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Ukraine’s ministry of infrastructure said it plans to hold negotiations with authorities in Turkmenistan to resume air traffic and boost commercial links between the two countries. In early September, Ukraine International Airlines postponed the launch of a Kiev-Ashgabat connection due to disagreements between the aviation authorities.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
OCT. 31 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A newspaper in Australia reported that the government was in talks with the Kyrgyz authorities to resettle refugees and asylum seekers in Kyrgyzstan. Under a hardline policy, Australia refuses entry to all migrants and refugees. Neither the Australian nor the Kyrgyz government have commented.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
OCT. 31 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan and Indonesia established a 30-day visa free regime which they said would promote tourism between the two countries. The visa-free regime with Indonesia contrasts with Azerbaijan’s constraints on European travellers. Over the past few years, Azerbaijan has increased restrictions on European travel.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
NOV. 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tony Adams, the former England and Arsenal footballer, has become the unlikely cheerleader of Azerbaijan’s healthcare system.
Media quoted him as saying that he credits doctors in Azerbaijan, where he is working as director of football at the country’s biggest club Gabala, with saving his life with heart surgery.
He said that he referred himself to the Gabala team doctor after feeling chest pains.
“The brilliant surgeons at the Medical Plaza (hospital) did a fantastic job, as has been reiterated to me by my cardiologist in the UK,” he said.
“I know full well that without the brilliance of Dr Uzeyir Rahimov and his team I would not be alive now: a minor heart operation saved my life.”
Mr Adams, 49, is one of England’s most successful living footballers. He played more than 650 times for Arsenal, between 1983 and 2002, winning 10 trophies. He also played 60 times for England.
Mr Adams started managing Gabala in 2010.
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(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)
OCT. 29 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A journalist documenting forced labour practices in east Uzbekistan said his office had been burnt down in an act of sabotage, media reported. Dmitiry Tikhonov also said that files with data on a number of specific cases appear to have been stolen from his office in Angren.
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Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 255, published on Nov. 6 2015)