Category Archives: Uncategorised

S&P cuts Kazakhstan outlook

JUNE 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Credit rating agency Standard & Poor’s reduced Kazakhstan’s outlook to negative from stable, hitting the country’s reputation as a target for foreign investment.

Slower economic growth estimates and the limited impact of monetary policy have dented Kazakhstan’s reputation and Standard & Poor’s said it could cut its BBB+ rating within the next two years. BBB+ is Standard & Poor’s third lowest investment grade rating.

Kazakhstan cut the value of its tenge currency in February by 20% and Standard & Poor’s said that if the Central Bank was forced to intervene again it would almost certainly cut the rating.

Since February sanctions against Russia over its actions in Ukraine have hit the entire former Soviet region, cutting economic growth rates.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 189, published on June 18 2014)

Georgia’s TBC Bank lists on London Stock Exchange

JUNE 11 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – TBC Bank became the second Georgian company to list on the London Stock Exchange (LSE) after it raised $240m at an IPO. The IPO valued TBC at around $640m and demonstrated that investors are keen to buy shares in companies in Georgia once again, nearly six years after it fought a brief war with Russia.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 189, published on June 18 2014)

Turkmenistan promotes solar power

JUNE 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmenistan’s President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov ordered the Academy of Science to set up a solar power institute to examine whether the renewable energy can be generated on an industrial basis, media reported. Turkmenistan sees itself as a regional energy super-power. It has signed deals to supply a third of China’s gas.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 189, published on June 18 2014)

Kazakhstan sets low tariffs for clean energy

JUNE 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan’s government set a series of low price rates for energy generated from renewable resources, media reported, part of drive to increase the proportion of green power it uses. Kazakhstan has said it wants renewable energy usage to make up 40% of its power consumption by 2050.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 189, published on June 18 2014)

South Korean leader visits Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan

JUNE 16 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – South Korean president Park Geun-hye started a six day trip to Central Asia by visiting Tashkent.

There Ms Guen-hye pledged to increase cooperation in gas and solar power sector.

This was just the first stage in an important Central Asia trip for the South Korean leader. Ms Guen-hye now travels to Astana and then to Ashgabat laying down a serious marker in the region.

Central Asia is a natural region for South Korea to look to carve out an overseas trade foothold. Soviet dictator Josef Stalin ensured that this was the case.

In the 1930s, worried about their loyalty, Stalin moved hundreds of thousands of Koreans living in the east of the Soviet Union to Central Asia. Most settled around Tashkent or Almaty.

Now both Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan have large Korean minorities. Many ethnic Koreans are involved in business and some in politics. There are Korean restaurants in cities in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan and transport links with Seoul are well-established.

Ms Geun-hye is looking to leverage these ties to ensure that South Korea is able to tap into the region’s energy reserves as well as putting Korean companies in a good position to do business.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 189, published on June 18 2014)

Bread prices spike in southern Kazakh city

JUNE 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Bread prices in Shymkent increased by around a third overnight to 50 tenge ($0.25) a loaf from 35 tenge, media reported. This is the second bread price spike in south Kazakhstan this year and it could spark protests. Regional government officials blamed bakeries for the price increase.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 188, published on June 11 2014)

Uzbek court releases prisoner

JUNE 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Uzbekistan ordered the release of the critically ill prisoner Abdurasul Khudoynazarov, media quoted Human Rights Watch as saying. Khudoynazarov had served 8-1/2 years of a 9 year prison sentence for allegedly stirring anti-government protests around the city of Andijan, east Uzbekistan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 188, published on JUNE 11 2014)

Georgian president flies to Kiev

JUNE 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgian president Giorgi Margveleshvili flew to Kiev for the inauguration of the new Ukrainian president Petro Poroshenko, underling Georgia’s support for Ukraine’s fight against pro-Russia separatists. Georgia’s former president Mikheil Saakashvili was also at the ceremony.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 188, published on June 11 2014)

Azerbaijan not tackling corruption

JUNE 6 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijan is not doing enough to tackle corruption, the European Bank of Reconstruction and Development’s (EBRD) country chief, Neil McKain, told Reuters. The EBRD is one of Azerbaijan’s biggest foreign investors.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 188, published on June 11 2014)

Kyrgyzstan to join EEU by end-2014

JUNE 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan’s PM Djoomart Otorbayev said the country would be a member of the Russia-led Eurasian Economic Union by the end of 2014, Itar-Tass news agency reported. Mr Otorbayev’s comments were another indication that Kyrgyzstan is steadily moving towards Russia’s sphere of influence.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 188, published on JUNE 11 2014)