Category Archives: Uncategorised

Uzbek President signs billion dollar deals in S.Korea

MAY 28-30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbek President Islam Karimov completed a three day state visit to South Korea which laid the foundations to further develop relations between the two countries.

Mr Karimov and South Korean president Park Geun-hye signed deals worth $7.7b. The agreements cover many sectors ranging from financial to medical to agriculture sectors.

Compare the $7.7b worth of deals to trade between Uzbekistan and South Korea of $1.9b last year.

Mr Karimov appears to have deliberately chosen South Korea for his first foreign trip following his re-election in March for two important reasons.

South Korea is a close ally of the West, and a reception in Seoul offers Mr Karimov’s recognition and credence, and may serve as a stepping-stone for recognition by other capitals.

It is also important to note that Mr Karimov chose a country to visit that would not irritate either Moscow or Washington.

And there is also a cold, hard economic reason for choos- ing to visit South Korea so soon after winning re-election. Mr Karimov needs hard currency to boost the economy, which has been in a downward spiral since Western sanctions hit Russia and dented remittances.

South Korea and Uzbekistan are closely linked. The Soviet Dictator moved thousands of Koreans to Uzbekistan in the 1930s and 1940s.

There is still a large Korean diaspora living in Uzbekistan and, as well as being an important investor in Uzbekistan, after Russia and Kazakhstan, South Korea generates the most remittance flow.

An agreement from Mr Karimov’s trip to Seoul on the mutual recognition of drivers’ licenses also suggested that the two parties are expecting closer ties between the countries.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Turkmenistan wants electronics

MAY 29 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Apparently not content with a booming gas industry, Turkmen president Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov said that he wanted to develop an electronics industry. Mr Berdymukhamedov has been keen to push Turkmen industry.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Serbia boosts Azerbaijan’s aspirations

MAY 29 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Serbia has withdrawn from Russia’s Turkish Stream project, Serbian PM Alexander Vucic said, handing an important boost to Azerbaijan’s aspirations of becoming a major gas supplier to Europe. Russia plans to build a gas pipeline across the Caspian Sea to Turkey and then into Europe via the Balkans.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Georgia’s ministry building put on sale

MAY 29 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgia’s government has put a building in the centre of Tbilisi which houses the economy ministry up for sale, the first lot in a batch of state property earmarked for privatisation. Media reported that the government expected to sell the building as a potential hotel for $6m.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Kyrgyzstan passes anti-NGO bill

JUNE 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan’s parliament passed a preliminary reading of the so-called Foreign Agents Bill which will, basically, make it harder for local NGOs to receive money from Western organisations. The bill is similar to one passed by Russia in 2012.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Azerbaijanis turn to dollars

JUNE 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijanis have lost confidence in the manat currency since a 33% devaluation earlier this year, eurasinet.org reported. It said dollar accounts in Azerbaijan now made up 70% of the total, the highest proportion in a decade.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

US criticises Tajikistan

JUNE 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The US embassy in Dushanbe issued a statement criticising the Tajik government for block- ing access to various websites. It said that Tajikistan should lift restrictions on the Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty and Facebook websites. These have been inaccessible since May 28.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Inflation rises in Georgia

JUNE 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Inflation in Georgia in May rose to 3.5% from 2.5% in April, the Georgian national statistics agency said. Economists have warned that the fall in the value of the lari would spur inflation.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Prosecutor issues arrest warrant for Tajik police chief

JUNE 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan’s prosecutor-general issued an arrest warrant for Gulmurod Khalimov, the paramilitary police chief who defected to IS in Syria.

Mr Khalimov was also formally stripped of his military title. He had been a colonel.

He appeared at the end of May in a video from Syria in which he cradled a sniper rifle and pledged to ferment revolution in Tajikistan.

Mr Khalimov had left his home in April, telling his wife that he was going away on a business trip for a few days.

Instead he became IS’ most high-profile recruit from Central Asia.

Central Asian countries are increasingly worried about the ability of IS to recruit disenfranchised and poor young men from the region. With his glamour and seniority, Mr Khalimov’s recruitment has added extra weight to the IS propaganda programme.

Mr Khalimov had led Tajikistan’s paramilitary OMON unit and had been trained by special forces in the United States and in Russia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)

Azerbaijani President’s daughter divorces

MAY 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Leyla Aliyeva, the third daughter of Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev, and the Azerbaijani-Russian pop singer Aras Agalarov have formalised their divorce, media reported. They were married in 2006 and have two sons.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 234, published on June 4 2015)