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Proctor & Gamble says it is considering building a plant in Uzbekistan

TASHKENT/Jan. 7 2020 (The Bulletin) — Proctor & Gamble, one of the world’s largest producer of consumer goods, is considering setting up a production site in Uzbekistan, the Uzbek government said.

According to Uzbekistan’s ministry of investment and foreign trade, regional executives from Proctor & Gamble flew to Tashkent for a meeting with ministers.

“Procter & Gamble is currently studying the industrial potential of Uzbekistan and considering the prospects of creating high-tech production facilities in the country,” media reports said of the meeting on Dec. 24. “In the operations in the country, the company will follow American standards of quality and environmental friendliness.”

If Proctor & Gamble did set up a production facility in Uzbekistan it would be a major coup for the Uzbek government which has been trying to woo foreign investment and to present itself as the premier business location in Central Asia.

The company, which is based in Cincinnati and is listed on the New York Stock Exchange, is best known for its brands such as washing up powders Ariel and Tide, shampoo brand Head & Shoulders and shaving products sold as Gillette. It has not commented on the Uzbek government statement.

Like other Western companies, Proctor & Gamble reentered the Uzbek market in 2017, the year after Islam Karimov, the reclusive autocrat who had run the country since the 1991 collapse of the USSR, died. Shavkat Mirziyoyev, who had been PM under Karimov, took over as president and immediately promised to dismantle most of the hardline policies. He also made it easier for Western companies to repatriate profits.

There are currently 260 people working at Proctor & Gamble’s distribution site in Uzbekistan.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

New head of CSTO appointed

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JAN. 3 2020 (The Bulletin) — Belarussian General Stanislav Zas was appointed Secretary-General of the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) ending more than a year of rows and acrimony over who was going to lead the FSU military group. In 2018, after only 1-1/2 years into his 3-year posting, Armenian general Yuri Khachaturov was arrested for ordering police to shoot protesters in Yerevan in 2008.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

Police tear down protesters’ tents in Tbilisi

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DEC. 312019 (The Bulletin) — Rights activists accused the police in Georgia of using the pretext of New Year’s Eve celebrations to dismantle anti-government demonstrations. The protesters had maintained a camp outside Georgia’s parliament since November when MPs voted against backing their demands for election reform. Police said that nine people were arrested during the operation.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

South Ossetia releases Georgian doctor

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DEC. 28 2019 (The Bulletin) — Separatist forces controlling the breakaway Georgian region of South Ossetia released Vazha Gaprindashvili, a senior Georgian doctor, after holding him since Nov. 9 for crossing into the province illegally. They had given him a prison sentence of one year and nine months on Dec. 20 but had then changed their minds and released him. Tension has been rising around the breakaway region. Russia backs its independence but only a handful of other Russian proxies have backed the Kremlin. Dr Gaprindashvili, head of Georgia’s association of orthopaedics and traumatologists, said that he had done nothing wrong in trying to reach a patient in South Ossetia on Nov. 8 as he does not recognise its independence.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

Kyrgyz court refuses to approve extradition to Turkey of suspected Gulenist teachers

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BISHKEK/Dec. 30 2019 (The Bulletin) — A district court in Bishkek shunned Turkey by refusing to sanction the extradition of two Turkish teachers suspected of being so-called Gulenists.
The court said that the extradition of the teachers, approved earlier by Kyrgyzstan’s deputy prosecutor general, was illegal.

Rights activists have said that so-called Gulenists who have been extradited from countries in Central Asia and the South Caucasus have been tortured in Turkey and don’t get fair trials. The Turkish government blames Gulenists for a failed coup in 2016 and has promised revenge.

The press secretary of the Pervomaisky District Court, Asel Ravshanbekova, didn’t give the Kyrgyz branch of the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty any reasons for the court to overturn the deputy prosecutor’s extradition approval other than to say that it was considered “illegal”.

Even so, the court’s decision is a sharp and rare blow to Turkey’s status in the Central Asia and South Caucasus region. With the exception of Kazakhstan and Armenia, the other countries in the region have been quick to round up Turkish teachers working at schools and universities regarded as Gulenists. These were educational institutions set up in the 1990s by followers of Fethullah Gulen, an Islamic cleric who was once an ally of Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan but now lives in exile in the United States.

These Gulen-linked schools were considered to be the best schools and universities in each country in the region, producing government ministers and business leaders.

In 2017, Turkey as much as told Kyrgyzstan that it needed to close down the Gulen school network known as Sebat. Kyrgyzstan refused but did rebrand the schools as Zepat. These fee-paying schools still educate many sons and daughters of the elite.

Kyrgyzstan-Turkey relations have improved since Sooronbai Jeenbekov took over as president in 2017 but the strain over the fate of the Gulen schools and their teachers has damaged some of the goodwill.

Mr Jeenbekov took over as president from Almazbek Atambayev, who had pushed a foreign policy that, while not anti-Turkey, was definitely cool towards its traditional ally.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

Uzbekistan to supply Japan with uranium worth $1b

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JAN. 8 2020 (The Bulletin) — Uzbekistan signed a deal with Japan to supply uranium worth $1b to Japan between 2023 and 2030, a deal that highlights Uzbekistan’s status as one of the world’s top uranium producers. Neighbouring Kazakhstan is considered to be the world’s biggest uranium producer.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

World Bank predicts strong growth in the region

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JAN. 10 2020 (The Bulletin) — In its annual growth predictions, the World Bank said that Uzbekistan’s economy would grow by 5.7% in 2020, the fastest growth in Central Asia. In the south Caucasus, the World Bank said that Armenia would record the fastest growth with a 5.1% rise compared to a 2.3% rise in Azerbaijan’s economy and a 4.3% rise in Georgia’s economy.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

Tajik and Uzbek officials meet to discuss border issues

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JAN. 8 2020 (The Bulletin) — Officials from Tajikistan and Uzbekistan met in Tashkent to approve technical documents that they said should lay the basis for the demarcation of their shared border, a dispute that has at times over the past 30 years has triggered violence. A series of meetings between officials to decide on the border issues are scheduled for this year.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

Finance company relocates from Bermuda to Nur Sultan’s AIFC

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JAN. 9 2020 (The Bulletin) — The Astana International Finance Center (AIFC), the government-backed project in Nur Sultan that was supposed to kick start the Kazakh capital as a regional financial hub, said that a company called Kazakhstan Energy Reinsurance Company had relocated from Bermuda. The AIFC said that the Kazakhstan Energy Reinsurance Company, an affiliate of state energy company Kazmunaigas, would maintain all the legal rights it enjoyed in Bermuda.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin

Former diplomat jailed for treason in Uzbekistan

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JAN. 9 2020 (The Bulletin) — Uzbekistan jailed Kadyr Yusupov, 67, its former ambassador to Britain and an adviser on Uzbek-Chinese trade, for 5-1/2 years for treason. Human rights activists said that Yusupov had been forced to admit his guilt at a secret trial. The allegations of treason against Yusupov have not been fleshed out. He was arrested in December 2018, a few days after allegedly jumping in front of a train on the Tashkent metro.

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— This story was first published in issue 433 of the weekly Bulletin on Jan. 13 2020

— Copyright owned by the Central Asia & South Caucasus Bulletin