MAY 3 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A Kazakh investment fund has agreed to sponsor the Britain-based Williams Formula 1 racing team, media reported. The deal, worth an undisclosed amount and hatched between Williams and the investment company TAK Group, will give more publicity to the Kazakh capital Astana.
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(News report from Issue No. 134, published on May 6 2013)
MAY 3 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazmunaigas, Kazakhstan’s national energy company, sold Eurobonds worth $3b in April, media reported quoting its press service. The relatively low interest on the debt — $2b 30-year Eurobonds sold with an interest of 5.8% and $1b 10-year Eurobonds with 4.45% — shows the attractiveness of lending to Kazmunaigas.
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(News report from Issue No. 134, published on May 6 2013)
MAY 2 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) – After months of veiled negotiations, Italy’s UniCredit bank sold ATF Bank, its Kazakh subsidiary, for $500m. The buyer is the relatively unknown Galimzhan Yesenov, son-in-law of the mayor of Almaty.
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(News report from Issue No. 134, published on May 6 2013)
JAWSHANGOZ/Tajikistan, APRIL 29 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — In this hamlet in the mountains of eastern Tajikistan, Firishtamo Shohnavruzov made a note in his battered jotter.
Like many poor farmers, Shohnavruzov has opened his home to international visitors.
“Two guests paid $5 each for plov (a rice and mutton dish) and chai (tea) and $14 for lodging,” he said.
The Pamirs are remote and rugged but with an increasing number of tour operators and basic B&Bs, they are attracting a growing number of intrepid travellers. In the first half of 2011, for example, the Pamir Eco Cultural Tourism Association (PECTA) noted a near 40% increase in the number of tourists to their office in Khorog, the main town in the south of the country.
Shohnavruzov Homestay is typical of the locally-based tourism PECTA, set up in 2008, wants to encourage. The main attraction is the so-called Pamir Highway, an arduous 500km Soviet-built road over soaring mountain passes that connects Khorog to Osh in Southern Kyrgyzstan.
There are still many, basic, infrastructure challenges, though.
Gulnara Akhmatbekovna, a tour guide in Murgab near the Kyrgyz border, leafed through various guides printed out in different languages.
“What I’d really like is an internet connection that doesn’t run on a generator,” she said.
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(News report from Issue No. 133, published on April 29 2013)
APRIL 23 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bulat Utemuratov, one of Kazakhstan’s richest men and an associate of Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev is apparently weighing up buying into Italian soccer club Inter Milan, Italy’s media reported. Some of the richest men in the former Soviet states have invested in European soccer clubs over the past decade.
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(News report from Issue No. 133, published on April 29 2013)
APRIL 26 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — British fraud investigators opened an investigation into Kazakh miner ENRC after several senior executives resigned following allegations of corruption, media reported. ENRC is listed on the London stock exchange but its three main Kazakh shareholders have said they are looking into taking the business private.
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(News report from Issue No. 133, published on April 29 2013)
APRIL 28 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh industry minister Asset Issekeshev said on a visit to Dubai that the Dubai-based port operator DP World has pledged to invest $1b into Aktau port and the Khorog-Eastern Gates free zone area, media reported. Aktau is Kazakhstan’s main Caspian Sea port. The Khorog-Eastern Gates free zone lies on the border with China.
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(News report from Issue No. 133, published on April 29 2013)
APRIL 19 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Underlining China’s increased dominance across the Central Asia and South Caucasus region, a senior Chinese economic official said that trade with Azerbaijan increased by 17.6% in 2012. Zhang Wei, chairman of China’s Council for the Promotion of International Trade, said that China-Azerbaijan trade was worth $1.2b in 2012.
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(News report from Issue No. 132, published on April 22 2013)
APRIL 18 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kazakh police detained Yerlan Tatishev, a former director of BTA Bank which the government bailed out in 2009, on embezzlement charges, media reported. BTA Bank’s former chairman, Mukhtar Ablyazov, is currently on the run having been found guilty of perjury by a British court.
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(News report from Issue No. 132, published on April 22 2013)
APRIL 19 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Carlsberg’s Uzbek subsidiary in Tashkent, UzCarlsberg, re-started beer production after a year’s break, local media reported. The Uzbek authorities had accused the UzCarlsberg of dodging taxes of nearly $5m. Foreign investors in Uzbekistan have previously accused the authorities of harassment.
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(News report from Issue No. 132, published on April 22 2013)