NOV. 23 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Many of Georgia’s top politicians and businessmen gathered at the funeral in Tbilisi of former economy minister Kakha Bendukidze who died this month in London. Bendukidze was aged 58 when he died. He was the architect of the privatisation drive under former president Mikheil Saakashvili.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)
NOV. 24 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Seemingly trying to rile the West, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed an enhanced military and strategic partnership with Abkhazia, one of Georgia’s two breakaway regions.
NATO immediately accused Russia of trying to annex the region which only Russia and a handful of its allies have recognised as independent.
Under the deal, Russia will defend Abkhazia’s borders and strengthen its military partnerships as well as give Abkhazia around $110m.
According to Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, the new de facto Abkhazian president Raul Khajimba said the deal recognised “equal relations between two sovereign states”.
As well as various economic and military deals, Russia has around 4,000 soldiers stationed in Abkhazia.
Western countries suspect that Russia only encourages Abkhazia and South Ossetia to seek independence from Georgia to act as an irritation to Tbilisi. They also suspect that the Kremlin may have similar ideas for eastern Ukraine which is in the middle of a civil war, focused around Donetsk.
Russia and Georgia fought a brief war over South Ossetia in 2008. Relations are only normalising now.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)
NOV. 24 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Latvian president Andris Berzins flew to Tbilisi for a two-day visit that will culminate in laying a wreath at a Georgian war memorial and a declaration of Georgia’s territorial integrity. This is important for Georgia because Latvia will hold the EU’s rotating presidency for the first half of 2015.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)
NOV. 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The United States transferred three Yemen prisoners from Guantanamo Bay to Georgia, the second transfer since 2010, media reported. The prisoner renditions are controversial and have been banned in many countries. Georgia is one of the United States’ most staunch allies and hopes to join NATO.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)
NOV. 14 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan’s energy transport monopoly KazTransGas regained control of its Georgian subsidiary, KazTransGas-Tbilisi. Georgia had effectively expropriated the company in 2009 over unpaid debt. KazTransGas- Tbilisi owns a 2,400km gas distribution system in Georgia.
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(News report from Issue No. 209, published on Nov.19 2014)
NOV. 14 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kakha Bendukidze, Georgian economy minister under President Mikheil Saakhashvili and architect of the country’s massive privatisation drive, died suddenly in London aged 58.
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(News report from Issue No. 209, published on Nov.19 2014)
NOV. 15 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – An estimated 30,000 people crammed into the centre of Tbilisi for perhaps the largest anti-government rally since the Georgian Dream coalition defeated the party of former President Mikheil Saakashvili in a parliamentary election in 2012 and a presidential election in 2013.
The demonstrators waved Georgian flags and pictures of Mr Saakashvili, who now lives in New York and is wanted by Georgia’s prosecutors for various alleged crimes, and shouted anti-Russia slogans.
They blamed Russia for annexing the rebel states of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. Importantly they also blamed their current government for not standing up to Russia.
Mr Saakashvili addressed the crowd via a Kiev video-link.
“Let’s show Georgia’s government that the nation is united against the serious threat to its independence, its future,” he said.
The importance of the rally, though, was not the appearance of Mr Saakashvili on a video-link but its size. It hasn’t taken long for the glamour of the Georgian Dream coalition to fade.
Allies in the EU and the United States have accused Georgian Dream of petty revenge tactics in pursuing former ministers and charging them with various crimes. Earlier this month PM Irakli Garibashvili also sacked the popular defence minister, Irakli Alasania, triggering a wave of resignations.
Street politics are still a major force in Georgia and the rally could be a sign that after a relatively calm 12 months, instability is returning to Georgian politics.
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(News report from Issue No. 209, published on Nov.19 2014)
NOV. 14 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – A suicide bomber injured three Georgian soldiers guarding the Bagram air base in Afghanistan, media quoted Georgia’s ministry of defence as saying. Georgia has been an enthusiastic supporter of the US-led war in Afghanistan. It sees support as building momentum towards NATO membership.
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(News report from Issue No. 209, published on Nov.19 2014)
LONDON/United KIngdom, NOV. 19 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) — Kakha Bendukidze, one of the chief architects of Georgia’s radical privatisation drive under President Mikheil Saaskhvili, has died in London aged 58.
He had recently undergone minor heart surgery and there was no suggestion of foul play.
A biologist who became a wealthy businessman towards the end of the Soviet Union, Bendukidze is best known for being the economy minister under Mr Saakashvili. Under Bendukidze, Georgia pursued one of the most aggressive privatisation schemes in the world.
This massive privatised and tax cutting drive — dubbed Bendunomics — attracted both praise and criticise. Praise from international organisations, such as the World Bank and the IMF, which champion private ownership over state ownership but criticism from rivals who pointed out that lucrative assets which had formerly belonged to the state ended up in the hands of Mr Saakashvili’s allies.
Before he was appointed economy minister in 2004, Bendukidze was a high profile businessmen in Russia advocating a low tax regime and reduced state intervention. He had been on close terms with Mikhail Khodorkovsky, who was arrested and imprisoned on tax evasion charges, largely interpreted as being linked to his various challenges to Russian President Vladimir Putin.
After Mr Khodorkovsky’s arrest and imprisonment, Bendukidze decided that it was time to leave Russia and he readily accepted a position in Mr Saakashvili’s revolutionary government.
A larger than life figure, both in terms of his size and booming personality, Bendukidze left Georgia earlier this year after the current government started to arrest and prosecute high- profile members of the previous administration for various economic crimes. Over the last few months Bendukidze had been advising the new president of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, and had been expected to take up a government position.
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(News report from Issue No. 209, published on Nov.19 2014)
NOV. 14 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – In an unusually strongly worded intervention, Georgian President Giorgi Margvelashvili warned parliamentarians the country faced a political crisis unless they pull together, media reported. Mr Margvelashvili’s statement was made in reference to the sacking of defence minister Irakli Alasania earlier this month.
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(News report from Issue No. 209, published on Nov.19 2014)