NOV. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Protests continued across parts of Kazakhstan over petrol shortages. One protest, captured in a photo essay on the US-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty website showed four men pulling a Soviet-era car to a petrol station near Almaty with a donkey cart.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
NOV. 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan agreed a deal for Astana to meet most of Bishkek’s electricity deficit, albeit at a price greater than Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev would have wanted to pay.
The deal, finalised during a meeting between Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and Mr Atambayev in Astana, means Kyrgyzstan must pay roughly three times more for the imported electricity than Kyrgyz citizens pay for domestically-produced electricity. Importantly, it also shows Kazakhstan’s political clout in Kyrgyzstan is growing.
An estimated deficit of 2b kilowatt hours (kWh) this year, caused by a shortage of water in its reservoirs, public reaction to shutoffs drove Bishkek and the potential to sign the deal.
Mr Atambayev will be relieved to have made the deal to import 1.4b kWh from Kazakhstan but here are still problems. He will have to make up the shortfall from somewhere else, possibly Turkmenistan, and he will have to finance the extra costs.
Currently the government has suggested modest tariff increases beginning Jan. 1. These are bound to irritate people in Kyrgyzstan.
Other agreements reached by Mr Atambayev and Mr Nazarbayev at the meeting are also indicative and suggested that Kazakhstan maintains significant leverage over its weaker neighbour.
Mr Nazarbayev promised that a fleet of Kyrgyzstan-bound fuel wagons, owned by Russian energy giant Rosneft and held by Kazakh customs officials without explanation since April, would be allowed to cross the two countries’ mutual border. He also pledged a $100 million grant to Kyrgyzstan as the country prepares to enter the Eurasian Economic.
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(News report from Issue No. 208, published on Nov.12 2014)
OCT. 29 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Azerbaijani media has refuted a suggestion by Kazakh deputy energy minister Uzakbay Karabalin that it will be able to supply Kazakhstan with enough fuel to make up for its on-going shortfall. Kazakhstan is looking for options to make up for the shortfall, which is frustrating ordinary people.
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(News report from Issue No. 207, published on Nov. 5 2014)
OCT. 7 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Repairs and upgrades to Kazakhstan’s three oil refineries should mean that by 2016 or 2017 the country is self-sufficient in petrol, Kazakh energy minister Vladimir Shkolnik said in comments to parliament. Kazakhstan’s energy ministry has ruled out building a fourth oil refinery to meet demand.
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(News report from Issue No. 203, published on Oct. 8 2014)
SEPT. 30 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Russian energy companies Lukoil and Bashneft will supply Kazakhstan with extra petrol and diesel fuel to make up for the current shortfall, Russian news agency RIA-Novosti quoted Russia’s energy minister, Alexander Novak, as saying. Kazakhstan has a shortage of refinery capacity which is causing shortages.
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(News report from Issue No. 202, published on Oct. 1 2014)
SEPT. 18 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Aktobe region in northwest Kazakhstan is on the brink of running out of petrol, the regional government’s business head Bagzhan Tlegenov said. Supplies of petrol have been particularly tight since August because of low refinery capacity in Kazakhstan and falling imports from Russia.
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(News report from Issue No. 201, published on Sept. 24 2014)
SEPT. 16 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan’s deputy energy minister, Uzakbai Karabalin, has said fuel shortage will continue despite government attempts to buy extra petrol from Azerbaijan and other neighbours, media reported. He said a third of Kazakhstan’s petrol came from Russia which was dealing with an economic slowdown.
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(News report from Issue No. 200, published on Sept. 17 2014)
AUG. 28 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Reports from the regions said that queues up to a kilometre-long have been forming outside petrol stations as motorist try to re-fuel their cars.
In the northern city of Uralsk only four of 11 petrol stations were serving motorists without vouchers.
A combination of low refining capacity while upgrades are made; the devaluation of the tenge currency, which has made imports more expensive; restrictions on the quantity of imports have reduced petrol supplies.
Officials have said that they are working to bring the situation under control but frustrations threaten to bubble over.
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazrbayev relies, to some degree, on the people becoming increasingly rich and comfortable for his popularity. If this starts to reduce, or become visibly impaired, his popularity may drop.
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(News report from Issue No. 198, published on Sept. 3 2014)
Petrol shortages have worsened in Kazakhstan over the past few months.
SEPT. 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan is on the brink of a Russian-fuelled petrol crisis according to independent news outlet Avesta.tj.
Unnamed sources told Avesta.tj that a collective of 25 Tajik fuel importers had written to President Emomali Rakhmon to tell him that he needed to buy extra fuel supplies to avoid potentially destructive price hikes. The problem, they said, was export restrictions at the Russian refineries where Tajikistan gets its fuel.
The letter said that supplies of A-92 petrol, imported from Russia, and other types of fuel, may be exhausted by mid-September unless he intervenes to ensure previous levels of supply. Apparently the letter attributes the restrictions to parallel shortages in energy rich Russia. Kyrgyzstan is also hurting. Petrol prices in Tajikistan’s northern neighbour have risen by 13.8% in some parts of the country over an eight month period.
Officially, according to the head of the Kyrgyz Oil Traders association, the reason for the restrictions is that multiple refineries in Russia are undergoing repairs simultaneously.
Unofficially, it’s more likely that sanctions imposed on Russia for its actions in Ukraine are biting.
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(News report from Issue No. 198, published on Sept. 3 2014)
AUG. 28 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Petrol stations across Uzbekistan are closing because of a lack of fuel supplies, media reported. Media has been reporting for some time that fuel supplies in Uzbekistan have been low. The government has also said that it is no longer able to subsidise petrol causing prices to rise, especially around Tashkent.
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(News report from Issue No. 198, published on Sept. 3 2014)