JAN. 16 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — From April 1, cars that don’t meet the Euro-4 emissions standard will be barred from being imported into Azerbaijan, government officials said. The decision will change the car market in Azerbaijan.
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(News report from Issue No. 168, published on Jan. 22 2014)
JAN. 22 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — With an easily accessible war to sign up for on their doorstep, Islamists in Azerbaijan have been slipping into Syria to fight in the conflict.
The APA news agency reported that seven Azerbaijani nationals have been killed this year in Syria.
The authorities in Azerbaijan worry that these men will return home radicalised, battle-hardened and keen to kick up old sectarian fights.
The exact number of Azerbaijanis who have travelled to Syria to fight in the conflict is difficult to pin down but it is probably between 100 and 200. Many, according to reports, are from the Sunni region of Sheki-Zagatala in northern Azerbaijan. Sheki-Zagatala nudges the Caucasus Mountains and the relatively lawless north Caucasus.
The problem for the Azerbaijani authorities is that recruiting videos for the radical Islamist groups fighting in Syria have become increasingly popular. They have given Islamists frustrated in Azerbaijan, the cause they have been looking for.
Writing for meydan.tv, Tamara Grigoryeva investigated reasons for this migration of Azerbaijan-based radicals to Syria. She quoted Gareth Jenkins at the Central Asia-Silk Road Studies programme as saying that it is not difficult for Azerbaijanis to travel to Syria.
“The Turkish government has recently been clamping down on the movement of jihadists across the border into Syria,” he was quoted by Ms Grigoryeva as saying.
“But people are still crossing. Even though it is more difficult than before, it is still relatively easy.”
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(News report from Issue No. 168, published on Jan. 22 2014)
JAN. 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The New York-based Human Rights Watch (HRW) said that in Azerbaijan people’s right to freedom of expression and the freedom to gather had worsened in 2013. In its annual report, HRW said the presidential election in October 2013 had been the trigger for most of the crackdown.
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(News report from Issue No. 168, published on Jan. 22 2014)
JAN. 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan has completed the delivery of 24 attack helicopters from Russia, media reported. Rich from oil, Azerbaijan has splurged on its military, buying weapons and other equipment from Israel and Russia. Azerbaijan ordered the 24 Mi-35M helicopters from Russia in September 2010.
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(News report from Issue No. 168, published on Jan. 22 2014)
JAN. 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned energy company, is considering buying a network of petrol stations in Turkey, media reported. Media said it was eyeing up the Petrol Ofisi filling stations, owned by Austria’s OMV, the largest network in Turkey. If the sale does materialise it will be one of SOCAR’s biggest overseas investments.
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(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)
JAN. 11 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The World Bank and Azerbaijan signed a $42m deal for waste management projects, media reported. Analysts have said a plan is needed to deal with a projected doubling of waste expected in Azerbaijan over the next 20 years generated by a combination of income and population growth.
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(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)
JAN. 9 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Vugar Gashimov, a 27-year-old Azerbaijani chess Grandmaster, died from a brain tumor in a German hospital.
Azerbaijanis revere their chess champions and news of Mr Gashimov’s death reverberated around Baku and triggered a government reaction. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev sent a letter of condolences to Mr Gashimov’s family and Azad Rahimov, the minister of sport, attended his funeral.
Chess is important to Azerbaijan and in the wider South Caucasus.
In contrast to most other sports, Azerbaijan is something of a world-beater in chess. Garry Kasparov, considered one of the greatest ever chess players was born in Baku.
In central Baku, 22-year-old Irada Nagiyeva, a student, was on her way to lunch. She summed up the impact of Mr Gashimov’s death to Azerbaijan.
“I was quite upset about the death of Vugar Hashimov,” she told a Conway Bulletin correspondent. “He was a champion that represented us worldwide.”
Mr Gashimov was considered an exciting, creative chess player, often willing to make daring moves that others would avoid playing.
His highest international ranking was sixth in the world in November 2009 and he had ranked at tenth in January 2012 before ill health forced him to retire from the sport.
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(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)
JAN. 15 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — The announcement earlier this month that Musavat, the oldest and arguably the most influential anti-government party, had left an opposition coalition triggered several analysts to conclude that opposition politics in Azerbaijan was in terminal decline.
To recap briefly, Musavat announced on Jan. 7 that it had decided to leave the opposition coalition dubbed the National Council of Democratic Forces (NCDF) after what was considered a poor presidential election campaign in October.
Musavat didn’t specify why it had decided to leave the coalition but their partners in the uneasy alliance accused them of selling out.
The NCDF was always an ambitious project drawing in the various strands of Azerbaijan’s opposition groups from pro-Western liberals to pro-Islam reactionaries and everything in between.
Musavat may only have had 12 members of the original 129 NCDF but symbolically they were very important. Their departure is just as important.
It also comes on the back of other departures, leaving a core rump in the opposition alliance.
Camil Hasani, the chairman of the NCDF and its rather beleaguered presidential candidate in October, has pledged to continue to keep the organisation as a viable opposition group. The reality is, though, that after a poor election and with the coalition splitting, opposition politics in Azerbaijan is in poor health.
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(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)
JAN. 10 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Azerbaijan’s economy grew by 6% in 2013 up from 2.2% in 2012, media quoted President Ilham Aliyev as saying. The strong growth figure will be a boost for Mr Aliyev. One of the government’s key targets is to increase inflation. Last year, Mr Aliyev said, inflation roughly doubled to 2.4%.
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(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)
JAN. 13 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Highlighting China’s increased interest in business in the south Caucasus, executives from the Nakhchivan Automobile Plant in south Azerbaijan flew to Chongqing for talks on expanding its cooperation with Lifan, a Chinese car brand. Nakhchivan Automobile Plant plans to produce 2,500 to 3,000 Lifan cars this year.
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(News report from Issue No. 167, published on Jan. 15 2014)