Tag Archives: business

New refinery opens in Tajikistan

MARCH 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – A new refinery opened in Tajikistan’s northern town of Kanibadam, a major boost to the country’s oil products output. Naftrasom, a private company owned by Nosir Usmonov, built the plant with a $3.5m investment. The refinery will have a capacity of 70,000 tonnes. As confirmed by Tajik President Emomali Rakhmon, who attended the inauguration, Tajikistan will import raw materials for the plant, mostly from Kazakhstan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

“World’s biggest bribe scandal” involves Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan

ALMATY, MARCH 29 2016, (The Conway Bulletin) — Unaoil, a consultancy based in Monaco, channelled millions of dollars of bribes to Emerging Market governments and their companies, including in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, on behalf of major Western firms, an investigation by Australia’s The Age and The Huffington Post said.

The report used data from a massive cache of leaked emails and corporate documents from 2001-2012 to unveil what it described as “the world’s biggest bribe scandal.”

The Ahsani family, Monaco millionaires Ata and his sons Cyrus and Saman, ran Unaoil as a sort of lobbying intermediary. They denied allegations of bribe paying.

“What we do is integrate Western technology with local capability,” Ata Ahsani told the investigation team.

Effectively, the report said of Unaoil: “Its operatives bribe officials in oil-producing nations to help these clients win government-funded projects. The corrupt officials might rig a tender committee. Or leak inside information. Or ensure a contract is awarded without a competitive tender.”

One of Unaoil’s biggest client was US engineering giant Kellogg Brown & Root (KBR), a former subsidiary of Halliburton, which operates in Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan.

In both Azerbaijan and Kazakhstan, KBR allegedly used Unaoil’s services to reach preferential deals and licences, mostly through personal connections and bribes to public officials.

KBR has not commented.

In Kazakhstan, leaked emails showed that Unaoil allegedly liaised with both Eni (codenamed “the spaghetti house”) and Kazmunaigas officials (codenamed “shashlik”) to secure tenders for KBR at the Kashagan offshore oil project.

Italian oil major Eni has not commented.

In Azerbaijan, both KBR and Swiss ABB allegedly won offshore oil contracts through insider information leaked by an in-country lead who had been bribed by Unaoil.

Swiss ABB has not commented.

After the report was published, police in Monaco raided the head- quarters of Unaoil. The FBI, the British Serious Fraud Office and the Australian Federal Police all launched major bribery investigations linked to the case.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Kyrgyz-Russian Dev. Fund to change rules

MARCH 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyz PM Temir Sariyev said that the misfiring Kyrgyz-Russian Development Fund would reduce the minimum loan it is prepared to hand out to $1m from $3m. The Fund had been criticised as too heavily geared towards large businesses, because of the high loan requirement and the co-financing clauses. Earlier this month Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev sacked Nursulu Akhmetova as chair of the Fund.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Kazakhstan-focused Roxi issues shares

MARCH 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan-focused Roxi Petroleum said it will issue 500,000 new shares on AIM to start trading from April 4. Roxi’s shares fell sharply by 8% on the day of the announcement, to 12p. Hit by low oil prices, Roxi’s shares had picked up in January, matching a rise in global prices.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Tajik power company owes $80m

MARCH 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Tajik hydropower company Sangtudinskaya GES-1, which operates the 670MW Sangtuda plant on the Vakhsh river, said Barqi Tojik, the national power company, owes it 562m somoni ($71m) for electricity. Russia’s state-owned Inter RAO owns 75% of Sangtudinskaya GES-1. Tajikistan’s energy ministry owns the remaining 25% of the company.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Kazakhstan-based Nostrum revenues down

MARCH 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan-focused Nostrum Oil and Gas posted a 42% fall in revenues in 2015, a consequence of sustained low oil prices and falling production. Last year, Nostrum’s profits were $449m compared to $782m in 2014. Production volumes also fell to 40,391 barrels of oil equivalent per day, a 9% fall on 2014. Nostrum cut its capital expenditure in 2015 for drilling operations by 54% to $58.7m.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Turkey Calik to build plant in Georgia

MARCH 30 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkey’s Calik Holding said it wants to build a combined-cycle thermal, wind and hydropower station and a gas storage facility in Georgia. Calik’s chairman Ahmet Calik and Georgia’s PM Giorgi Kvirikashvili met in Tbilisi and discussed Calik’s plans in Georgia. Calik has already built a 220 MW combined-cycle power plant in Gardabani, 40km south of Tbilisi.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Polyethylene imports drop in Kazakhstan

MARCH 31 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Imports of polyethylene, used to produce plastics, into Kazakhstan fell by 48% to 12,500 tonnes in January-February 2016 compared to the same period last year, MRC, a consulting company, said in a report. According to the report, imports in February stood at a similar level to last year. The fall may also be another indication of the worsening economic downturn.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

Russia will cut gas price, says Armenian PM

MARCH 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenian PM Hovik Abrahamyan said that Russia will reduce gas prices and that a final decision will be taken when PM Dmitri Medvedev visits Yerevan next week. The Armenian newspaper Haykakan Zhamanak reported that the discount could be 12%. The Hrapak newspaper also reported that the pricing could be switched to roubles.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)

New Astoria opens in Georgia

MARCH 29 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Astoria, a private Georgian company, opened its second hotel in the centre of Tbilisi, highlighting a boom in tourism. The company, owned by businessmen Malkhaz Manvelishvili and Amiran Gozalishvili, has spent 32m lari ($14m) on building the hotels. Tbilisi has been short of hotel rooms.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 274, published on April 1 2016)