SEPT. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A group of parliamentarians from Brazil visited Azerbaijan, promising to boost ties. The meeting is important for Azerbaijan as it works to widen its diplomatic reach, especially in the so-called BRIC countries which economists have said will power global growth.
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(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)
SEPT. 12 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Europe’s main election monitoring watchdog, the OSCE’s ODHIR, said it won’t send observers to Azerbaijan’s parliamentary election on Nov. 1 because the Azerbaijani authorities had imposed too many restrictions to make it worthwhile.
The decision by the OSCE not to monitor Azerbaijan’s elections for the first time since independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 is a major snub to Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev and pushes relations between Europe and Azerbaijan to a new low.
At a press conference later in the week with Czech President Milos Zeman who was visiting Baku, Mr Aliyev said: “As you probably know already, cooperation between the European Parliament and the Azerbaijani Parliament has been suspended. This is the result of the dirty campaign being waged against us.”
On Sept. 11, Azerbaijan cancelled an EU delegation visit to Baku and also started the process of pulling out of the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly, a group that pulls together the European Union and parliaments from the former Soviet Union.
The European Union and Azerbaijan have rowed over Mr Aliyev’s commitment to human rights and free speech. Azerbaijani officials have over the past couple of years detained and imprisoned several prominent human rights campaigners and journalists. Western governments have criticised Azerbaijan for the crackdown while Azerbaijan has said it is the victim of a smear campaign.
But the OSCE’s decision not to monitor Azerbaijan’s election is a watershed decision that pushes the one-time strong Western ally closer towards Russia.
The OSCE, which has never judged an election in Azerbaijan to be either free or fair, said that the conditions that the Azerbaijani authorities had set were just too restrictive to operate effectively.
It had wanted to place 30 long- term and 350 short-term monitors in Azerbaijan for the election but had instead only been allowed six long- term monitors and 125 short-term monitors.
“The restriction on the number of observers taking part would make it impossible for the mission to carry out effective and credible election observation,” the OSCE said in a press release.
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(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)
SEPT. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — On inflation, the data looks worse in Armenia, Azerbaijan and Tajikistan, compared to other economies which have managed to keep prices flat. In the period between Jan.-Aug. 2015, prices in Armenia grew by 4.8%, in Tajikistan by 3.2%, in Azerbaijan by 3.8%, according to their statistics committees.
Despite the steady growth in consumer prices, the region’s economies are containing inflation. For a comparison, inflation in Russia reached 15% in August.
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(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)
SEPT. 18 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Czech president Milos Zeman flew to Baku for an official visit where he met with Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev and visit parliament, only a few days after Europe-Azerbaijan relations dropped to a new low over an election monitoring row.
Mr Zeman, considered something of a maverick, praised Mr Aliyev and Azerbaijan, saying that Azerbaijan should reconsider its decision earlier this month to start the process of suspending its membership of the Euronest Parliamentary Assembly, a group that brings together the European parliament and parliaments from former Soviet countries.
Relations between the EU and Azerbaijan have dropped to a new low this year over European criticism of Azerbaijani human rights. Azerbaijani officials have responded by accusing the EU of trying to plot a coup.
Mr Zeman signed a number of business deals with Mr Aliyev on his trip.
Most importantly, coming only a few days after Europe’s vote monitoring watchdog, the OSCE, declined to observe Azerbaijan’s elections, it broke ranks.
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(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)
SEPT. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The foreign ministers of Azerbaijan and Armenia will meet in New York on the fringes of the UN General Assembly on Sept. 24/25, media quoted Azerbaijani foreign minister Elmar Mammadyarov as saying. Azerbaijan and Armenia are still officially at war over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh.
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(News report from Issue No. 248, published on Sept. 18 2015)
SEPT. 13 2017 (The Conway Bulletin) — The US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty said it had filed a complaint to the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg against Azerbaijan for deliberately hampering its reporting. RFE/RL was evicted from its office in Baku in December 2014 after the Azerbaijani authorities accused it of various tax related offences. RFE/RL has complained that the Azerbaijani authorities are dragging out their investigation to hamper attempts by RFE/RL to clear its name in court.
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— This story was first published in issue 343 of The Conway Bulletin on Sept. 15 2017
SEPT. 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – SOCAR confirmed that it wants to play a role in building a gas-fired power plant in Malta, media reported.
It’s unclear just why SOCAR, Azerbaijan’s state-owned oil and gas company, would want to build a power plant in Malta but it has an office on the island which it has said it uses to reduce its global tax bill.
SOCAR chairman Abdullayev Rovnag met with Maltese PM Joseph Muscat before a football match between Malta and Azerbaijan to discuss the two countries’ cooperation, local media reported.
There was no more detail from the meeting on the power station.
The Times of Malta, though, reported on SOCAR’s Maltese operations earlier this year. It said that SOCAR had set up a company in Malta in 2007 that acted as the parent company of Geneva-based SOCAR Trading. SOCAR Trading generates billions of dollars each year by trading oil. It saves itself a large chunk of tax, the Times of Malta reported, by booking the profit on these sales in Malta. Malta markets itself as a low tax, offshore base for companies trading in Europe.
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(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)
SEPT. 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – At an art exhibition in Paris, a reporter challenged Mehriban Aliyeva, wife of Azerbaijani president Ilham Aliyev, on whether she thought Azerbaijan was really a free country. The exchange was a rare challenge to the Aliyevs who has been accused of cracking down on free speech.
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(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)
SEPT. 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — French railway company Alstom has started producing 50 freight locomotive trains for Azerbaijan, media reported. The contract, signed in 2014, is worth around 300m euros. Alstom’s new AZ8A electric locomotives will be built specifically for Azerbaijan.
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(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)
SEPT. 9 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Trend news agency quoted a source in the Azerbaijani energy market as saying that the long-delayed extension to the Shimal power plant in Baku will finally be commissioned this year. The extension, which will double the capacity of the power station, was supposed to have been commission last year.
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(News report from Issue No. 247, published on Sept. 11 2015)