JULY 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A special commission on constitutional reforms started consultations to shift Armenia’s constitution towards a parliamentary democracy, media reported. Executive power, it is envisaged, would be held by the PM rather than by the president. A referendum is due at the end of 2015.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 240, published on July 16 2015)
JULY 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – India’s government ratified an agricultural deal with Armenia which should boost trade between the two countries, media reported. India is looking to boost relations with Central Asia and the South Caucasus.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 240, published on July 16 2015)
YEREVAN, JULY 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Armenia welcomed the announcement from Vienna, perhaps with even more gusto than its neighbours, that Western powers had agreed a deal with Iran that should see sanctions on it lifted.
As a landlocked country surrounded mainly by enemies, Armenia has viewed its southern neighbour as a necessary trade partner over the past few years. A sanction-free Iran, it is hoped in Yerevan, will also give Armenia a boost.
“Naturally, if we consider Armenia and Iran as not only neighbours with friendly relations but also having partnership relations, then the lifting of sanctions against Iran and growing regional role of Iran will benefit us in terms of Iran’s developing economic relations,” said Armenian orientalist Vardan Voskanyan on Shant TV.
Both countries have been forced to improve bilateral relations — both diplomatic and trade — over the past few years. Iran has experienced years in the international wilderness. Armenia’s neighbours include Turkey and Azerbaijan, its enemies.
Armenia supplies electricity to Iran in return for gas and there is a programme to build a joint hydro-electricity generating plant along the border on the Arax River.
Various other projects are planned, including a railway.
The Zhamanak newspaper wrote that Armenia can now become a transit country for Iranian goods heading to Europe.
“We just have to welcome the achievement of the agreement, hoping that the positive effects of this situation will impact us as soon as possible,” it said.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 240, published on July 16 2015)
JULY 16 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Governments across Central Asia and the South Caucasus welcomed a deal between the West and Iran over its nuclear programme that will allow sanctions on Tehran to be lifted, boosting their southern neighbour as an important trade partner once again.
Sanctions have weighed down Iran’s economy since 2002, stunting demand and undercutting its value to the region.
Central Asian and South Caucasus countries have legally been able to trade with Iran during the Western-imposed sanctions, but Iran’s economy had faltered. They now hope that, unshackled, Iran can generate wealth and demand throughout the region once again.
“It will have a positive impact on the economic and social development of all countries in the region, and will further strengthen the cooperation between Kazakhstan and Iran,” Kazakh foreign minister Erlan Idrissov said of the deal with Iran.
From Dushanbe to Yerevan, these sentiments were echoed across the region.
Georgia’s foreign ministry said in a statement: “(This) deal brings about normalisation of relations between Iran and Western countries, which will create new economic opportunities for countries both in the region and in the entire world.”
Iran has, over the past few years, been increasing links with both Central Asia and the South Caucasus.
In Azerbaijan it patched up a row over spying, in Georgia new regulations have allowed Iranians to set up businesses and Armenia has been busy making plans to increase trade with one of its few regional allies.
Its a similar story in Central Asia where ties with Iran are being improved and strengthened through new train links and product swaps.
And Iran’s economic impact on the region is significant. The ArcelorMittal steel factory at Temirtau in central Kazakhstan, for example, has long complained that sanctions on Iran severely dented demand for its steel.
With sanctions soon to be lifted and Iranian domestic and industrial demand primed to rise, Central Asia and the South Caucasus should benefit.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 240, published on July 16 2015)
JULY 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Remittances to Armenia in the first half of the year were down 33% to $408m, the Central Bank said. This is consistent with other countries in the south Caucasus which are struggling to cope with the fall out from a recession in Russia and a drop in oil prices.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)
JULY 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Russia’s military ordered a readiness check of its units stations in Armenia, the AFP news agency reported. The military garrison stationed in Armenia is one of Russia’s largest overseas deployments.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)
JULY 4 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Prices in Armenia have been dropping since January, its official statistics agency said. It said that overall inflation in June measured a 5.5% increase from the same month one year earlier. A drop in food prices has slowed inflation, the Central Bank said in a statement.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)
JULY 6 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – YEREVAN — Demonstrators in central Yerevan shifted their rally against an electricity price rise on Monday after police cleared barricades from the central street they had occupied for two weeks.
A Bulletin correspondent said around 1,000 people gathered at Freedom Square in the centre of Yerevan for another protest on Thursday evening. Police watched the protest but the atmosphere was calm.
“We demand one thing. The immediate and complete cancellation of the decision adopted by the State regulatory commission on baseless rise of electricity tariffs,” one of the protesters said.
Thousands of people have been protesting in the evenings in the centre of Yerevan, demanding that the government scrap the plan to raise the price of electricity, the third price rise in two years. The Russian-owned electricity company says the hike is necessary to support the power grid.
A state regulatory commission has already approved the price rise but in an apparent concession to the protesters earlier this month Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan ordered an audit of the electricity company.
And, on Wednesday, an Armenian state watchdog fined the electricity company $126,000 for violating the rights of consumers for demanding residents in new-built housing pay up front for their electricity.
The protests have widespread support even though the numbers have been dwindling.
“I’m very busy and that’s why I can’t take part in the protests,” said Georgi Barseghyan, a Yerevan resident. “So are other members of my family. But we all are with them.”
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 239, published on July 9 2015)
JULY 2 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – YEREVAN — Several hundred protesters continued to occupy a main street in central Yerevan, demonstrating against an electricity price increase.
The number of demonstrators has fallen and a Bulletin correspondent said there were now no more than about 1,000 people protesting on July 2, a drop from an estimated 10,000 protesters last week.
But the stand-off with riot police is still one of the most widely supported street demonstrations in Armenia for years.
Russia’s foreign minister, Sergei Lavrov, also warned the West against interfering, a sign of the Kremlin’s concern.
The protesters, who are mainly young, have defied police warnings to quit and the atmosphere has veered from tense to party-like over the past week. Last week police used water cannons and detained over 200 protesters when they tried to clear the square.
In a bid to appease the protesters, Armenia’s president Serzh Sargsyan suggested inves- tigating further a request by the Russia-owned electricity monopoly to find out just why the price increases are needed.
“I strongly believe that cancelling the tariff increase is extremely dangerous. Hence, until the given company pro- vides its opinion, the govern- ment will incur the entire burden of the tariff increase,” Mr Sargsyan said.
Most activists, though, dismissed Mr Sargsyan’s offer as a distraction.
“Increasing electricity tariffs will increase nearly all prices. Bread, butter, oil,” one activist at the protest said.
The electricity price rise is the third in two years.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 238, published on July 2 2015)
JULY 1 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s foreign currency reserves increased by $100m in May, the Central Bank told media. The increase shows that pressure on the dram has reduced. Last year, the Central Bank spent a third of its reserves defining the dram.
ENDS
Copyright ©The Conway Bulletin — all rights reserved
(News report from Issue No. 238, published on July 2 2015)