APRIL 2 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Defence ministers from Turkey and Azerbaijan flew to Tbilisi to discuss improving cooperation. Turkey, Azerbaijan and Georgia agreed last year to set up trilateral meetings. Armenia has been cast aside from the group.
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
APRIL 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Inflation in Georgia will hit 5% by end-2015, Central Bank chief Giorgi Kadagidze told Bloomberg. Mr Kadagidze said the devaluing lari was the main reason for the predicted inflation rise. Official statistics said annualised inflation measured 2.6% in March.
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
APRIL 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Alcohol prices in Georgia have increased by 10% over the past year, the national statistics agency said.
Alongside the rising price of food (3.7%) and healthcare (6%) the cost increase in Alcohol is a major driver of overall inflation. Annualised inflation for March measured 2.6%, up from 1.3% in April.
Analysts blame a fall in the value of the lari currency for this price rise but new taxes slapped on alcohol from March 1 have also driven up prices.
The government increased tax on beer by 50% and on hard liquor by 100%. It has said the tax will bring in an extra 100m lari ($45m) and harmonise Georgia’s tax laws with the EU.
And for now, it appears, thirsty consumers and bar owners in Tbilisi are shouldering the price rises.
Cory Greenberg, owner of Dive Bar in Tbilisi said distributors wanted more for a litre of beer but he has promised to keep prices steady.
“Not so much for charity, but because it is smart,” he said. “Let the others raise their prices and business will come to us.”
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
APRIL 7 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Community leaders in Georgia’s Pankisi Gorge have asked the government for more help to stop teenagers heading to Syria to join the militant group IS, media reported. The Pankisi Gorge is an Islamic stronghold in Georgia and has strong ethnic and cultural ties to Chechnya in Russia.
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
APRIL 2 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Roughly 55% of Georgians feel the country is heading in the wrong direction, a new poll for the US political group International Republican Institute (IRI) said.
This is a higher proportion than at any time since September 2009, during the aftermath of a brief war against Russia in 2008, when 63% of respondents said the country was heading in the wrong direction.
It is also, and this is important, the first time since March 2010 that a higher proportion of people have said that Georgia is heading in the wrong direction rather than the right direction. The IRI poll is, perhaps, the most accurate in Georgia and is a decent weather-mast to judge the general mood.
And it’ll make nasty reading for the governing Georgian Dream coalition which is having to deal with various economic problems as well as internal squabbling and accusations that it is using the Georgian justice system to settle old scores with officials who served under former president Mikheil Saakashvili.
In the IRI poll people’s main worries were the economy and Russian aggression. Over 60% of the respondents said the economy had worsened in the past couple of months and 76% said that Russia was the main threat to Georgia.
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
APRIL 3 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) — Former Georgian defence minister Irakli Alasania accused his successor, Mindia Janelidze, of ditching a deal to buy air-to-ground missiles from France, media reported. Mr Alasania, sacked last year, said scrapping the deal weakened Georgia.
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
APRIL 2 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Ukraine rejected Georgia’s request to extradite former president Mikheil Saakashvili, media reported. The government in Kiev, which is locked in a battle for control of eastern Ukraine with Russia, has appointed Mr Saakashvili as a special adviser. He is wanted in Georgia for alleged crimes.
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(News report from Issue No. 226, published on April 8 2015)
MARCH 30 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Elbit Cyclone, a subsidiary of Israel’s Elbit Systems, plans to build a factory in Georgia that will produce parts for passenger planes, media reported quoting Georgian economy minister Giorgi Kvirikashvili.
This is an important development for industry in Georgia as it represents a potential shift to a more hi-tech focus. Reports did not say what parts specifically the Georgian factory would produce for Elbit Cyclone, although all the factory output will be for export, but they did say the longer-term aim was to develop a hi-tech industrial sector.
The $85m cost of the project will be shared by the Georgian government and Elbit Cyclone. The factory will also employ 300 people.
And Elbit Systems already has a link with Georgia.
Prior to its 2008 war with Russia, Georgia bought several spy planes from the company. Elbit Systems is the largest publicly-traded military equipment manufacturer in Israel.
lbit Systems also makes technical equipment for the US military.
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(News report from Issue No. 225, published on April 12015)
MARCH 26 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Keen to boost the government’s progressive credentials, Georgian PM Irakli Garibashvili said he wanted the entire country to have access to high-speed internet by 2017. Currently around 40% of the country has high-speed internet, he said.
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(News report from Issue No. 225, published on April 12015)
MARCH 27 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – Following a clutch of other US fast-food chains, Domino’s Pizza expects to open its first store in Tbilisi in mid-April. Geopizza, which owns the Domino’s Pizza franchise in Georgia, said it wanted to set up 12 stores within five years.
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(News report from Issue No. 225, published on April 12015)