AUG. 18 2017 (The Bulletin) — Prosecutors in Sweden said that would charge a Stockholm-based employee of Canadian plane and train maker Bombardier with bribing Azerbaijani officials. According to news reports, the unnamed Russian national bribed to win a $340m contract. He has, reportedly, denied the charges.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 17 2017 (The Bulletin) — Kazakh miner KAZ Minerals said it was targeting production of 300,000 tonnes of copper in 2018 after a significant boost to output and copper prices in the first half of the year. KAZ Minerals is an open-pit mine and its operations are focused on Kazakhstan. It doubled production in the first half of the year from the same period in 2016.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 18 2017 (The Bulletin) — Akmurat Rejepov, former Turkmen President Saparmurat Niyazov’s spy chief, has died in prison 10 years after he was arrested for corruption and tax evasion, human rights groups said. Rejepov had been Niyazov’s security chief and had supposedly been influential in promoting Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov as his replacement when he died in 2006. He was arrested and imprisoned in May 2007.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 15 2017 (The Bulletin) — A fire destroyed up to 2,750 hectares of ancient forest in Armenia, Russian news agencies quoted ecologists as saying. Firefighters and military water-carrying planes took four days to control the fire that spread quickly because of the unusually dry conditions. Much of the Khosrov forest, reportedly planted in the 4th century, is made up of oak trees.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 19 2017 (The Bulletin) — Uzbekistan soum currency has been volatile since last week when Reuters reported that President Shavkat Mirziyoyev and the Central Bank wanted to reform exchange rates. Uzbekistan currently has two operational exchange rates — an official one and an unofficial one. The Black Market rate rose to around 7,300/$1 by Aug. 14, from around 8,400/$1 at the start of the month. It had lost ground by the end of the week, though, and finished at around 8,100/$1.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 17 2017 (The Bulletin) — BP said that the Azeri-Chirag- Guneshli (ACG) in the Azerbaijani section of the Caspian Sea produced 14m tonnes of oil in the first half of 2017, 12.5% less than during the same period in 2016. The drop will irritate Azerbaijani officials who have been pressuring BP to stop a production slippage at ACG, its biggest oil producer. In the first half of 2013, ACG had produced nearly 22m tonnes of oil.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 14 2017 (The Bulletin) — Reflecting sharp inflationary pressures, the Uzbek Central Bank said that it was going to introduce a 50,000 soum banknote. In June, in a rare statement, the Central Bank said that rising inflation had forced it to increase its key interest rate to 14% from 9%. Earlier this year it introduced a 10,000 soum note. The 50,000 soum note is equivalent to $12 on the official exchange market and around $6 on the unofficial market.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 18 2017 (The Bulletin) — The authorities in Azerbaijan froze the bank accounts of the Turan news agency, often described as the last independent Azerbaijani news outlet. Media quoted Turan’s managing director, Mehman Aliyev, as saying that the authorities were investigating alleged tax evasion of $22,000. He said that allegations were false.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 16 2017 (The Bulletin) — Uzbek president Shavkat Mirziyoyev has signed into law a decree that will scrap exit visas from Jan. 2019, state media reported. Repealing the exit visas is one of the most high-profiles decisions taken by Mr Mirziyoyev who has crafted himself as a moderniser and a reformer since taking over the presidency after the death of Islam Karimov in September 2016.
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(News report from Issue No. 340, published on Aug. 20 2017)
AUG. 19 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — Turkey’s economy minister, Nihat Zeybekci, said that the country was interested in joining the Eurasian Customs Union, the customs-free zone that includes the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU). The comments underline Turkey’s drift away from Europe towards Russia and Central Asia. The Eurasian Economic Union is led by Russia and also includes Belarus, Kazakhstan, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan. Importantly, Turkey did not say it wanted to join the EEU.
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(News report from Issue No. 341, published on Aug. 27 2017)