Tag Archives: Kazakhstan

Inflation in Kazakhstan is building, says Central Bank

DEC. 9 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan’s Central Bank kept interest rates at 9.25% and warned that inflationary pressure was building. It said that the weak tenge, which is bumping along at all-time lows, and a growing current account deficit was an inflation risk. Inflation is currently at around 5.5% but is expected to rise to 6% next year. >>See page 8 for more
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 431 of the weekly Bulletin on Dec. 9 2019

Comment: The CSTO has always lacked relevance

Leave a Reply

Other than spreading Russian influence, the CSTO is a military alliance lacking a clear mission. Opportunities to impose itself and carve out an identity have been missed, writes James Kilner.

NOV. 29 (The Bulletin) — For a military organisation that can pull together regular summits which include Russian President Vladimir Putin, the CSTO is oddly anaemic. On Nov. 28, the heads of states of the six members of the CSTO met in Bishkek for a summit that was only vaguely relevant.

This is a military organisation led by Russia which has dodged intervention on its doorstep and inside its borders. It currently doesn’t even have a permanent Secretary-General to lead it.

The CSTO, or to give it its full name the Collective Security Treaty Organisation, emerged from the ashes of the Soviet Union as something of a Warsaw Pact light, very light. It was supposed to impose a military pact over the rump of the Soviet Union that wasn’t looking West and to NATO. But its origins and ambitions have always been confused.

A CIS military grouping was formed after the Tashkent Pact of 1992, with Russia, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Uzbekistan, Azerbaijan, Belarus, and Georgia as members. When it came to be renewed in 1999, though, Georgia, Azerbaijan and Uzbekistan declined. This meant that when the CSTO was finally created in 2002 there were also only six members and it was dominated by Russia.

Recent inaction by the CSTO has also undermined its cause. The CSTO stood by in 2010 when fighting between ethnic Kyrgyz and ethnic Uzbeks in Osh, southern Kyrgyzstan, killed several hundred people and forced thousands of ethnic Uzbek to flee. Often too, as in Ukraine and Georgia, Russia is a belligerent, or backs a belligerent, in a conflict, forcing CSTO peacekeeping missions off the table.

Even when there is cooperation within the CSTO, it is couched as bilateral. Armenia has sent 100 deminers and doctors to support Russian rebuilding in Syria but other countries declined and the deal is considered to be between Russia and Armenia directly.

Of course, it doesn’t help that since the start of this year, the CSTO has been without a Secretary-General. Yuri Khachaturov, the Armenian former CSTO Secretary-General, is currently standing trial for “subverting the constitution” in Yerevan in 2008 when police killed at least 14 protesters. Members of the CSTO haven’t been able to agree on a replacement.

The CSTO holds value to Russia for helping it to spread political influence and to sell its military products, but as a militarily operational group it is largely irrelevant.

ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Astana beats Man U 2-1

Leave a Reply

NOV. 28 (The Bulletin) — Stunning the football world, Astana FC beat Manchester United 2-1 in their UEFA Europa League match in Nur-Sultan, recording arguably their top ever win. The match was a dead tie as Manchester United has already qualified for the next round but the roar from the crowd of around 30,000 when Astana won from 1-0 down showed how much the win meant to fans.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Major Kazakh grain exporter fails to pay bond coupon

Leave a Reply

NOV. 27 (The Bulletin) — Kazexportastyk, one of Kazakhstan’s biggest grain exporters, said that it had started talks with the Kazakh government after it failed to pay a bond coupon payment to investors under a debt restructuring deal. Russia’s Sberbank indirectly bought a stake in Kazexportastyk when it loaned the company $78m last year as part of a restructuring deal. Kazexportastyk missing a coupon payment may deter investors from other Kazakh companies.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Kazakh president wants Nur-Sultan to host UN agency

Leave a Reply

NOV. 26 (The Bulletin) — Kazakh president Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said that he wanted to put forward Nur-Sultan as a potential site for a UN centre for Sustainable Development Goals. Mr Tokayev’s predecessor as Kazakhstan’s president, Nursultan Nazarbayev, always wanted to garner the capital he built with international credibility and accolades.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Kazakhstan rejects $1.1b offer to settle Karachaganak row

Leave a Reply

ALMATY/NOV. 26 (The Bulletin) — Kazakhstan told the consortium of energy companies developing the Karachaganak gas field in the north of the country that their $1.1b offer to settle a dispute was insufficient.

The dispute has been festering for more than four years, undermining Kazakhstan’s reputation as a place to do business and frustrating the consortium led by Royal Dutch Shell which is developing Karachaganak, one of Kazakhstan’s most high-profile energy projects.

A resolution to the dispute had been announced in October last year, although it now appears to have fallen through.

Media quoted Kazakhstan’s first deputy energy minister Makhambet Dosmukhambetov saying that the government wasn’t happy with the $1.1b offer. He didn’t elaborate as to why the government had pulled back from accepting the payment but he did hint that more negotiations were needed to find a solution to the row.

“New circumstances have been uncovered,” he said.
None of the partners developing Karachaganak — Shell, Lukoil, Chevron and Kazmunaigas — have commented.

Kazakhstan originally filed a $1.6b claim against the consortium developing the Karachaganak consortium in 2015 because it said that it hadn’t been receiving a fair share of the profits.

Over the past few years, Kazakhstan has been trying to gain bigger stakes in energy projects that have been dominated by foreign companies. It has said that when many of the deals were made to develop gas and oil fields in the chaotic post-Soviet 1990s, the Kazakh government was in an unfairly weak position.

Karachaganak, near Aktobe in the north of Kazakhstan, is one of the country’s most important oil and gas projects. It generates around 50% of Kazakhstan’s gas and 18% of the country’s oil.

ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Unplanned repairs hit Kashagan output

Leave a Reply

ALMATY/NOV. 26 (The Bulletin) –Unplanned maintenance work at the Kashagan oil field in the Kazakh sector of the Caspian Sea has hit output more sharply than expected, Reuters reported by quoting two sources.

The sources said that production at the end of November was around 184,000 barrels of oil per day (bpd), down from 400,000bpd at the start of the month. Kazakh officials had previously said that production was down to around 270,000bpd.

Kashagan, which is being developed by Eni, ExxonMobil, CNPC, Royal Dutch Shell, Total, Inpex and Kazakh state energy firm Kazmunaigas, has been beset by problems. It opened late and billions of dollars over budget.

There have also been a series of technical problems that have slowed its production. Kashagan is one of Kazakhstan’s biggest oil fields.

ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Kazakhstan delays IPOs again

Leave a Reply

NOV. 25 (The Bulletin) — Hoping for high valuations, Kazakhstan will delay by a year plans to sell off stakes in Air Astana, Kazakhtelecom and energy company Kazmunaigas, media reported by quoting Kazakh finance minister Alikhan Smailov. Stakes in nuclear company Kazatomprom were sold off last year on the London Stock Exchange but the IPOs of other companies have been delayed several times.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Kazakhstan wants to join Russian gas pipeline to China project

Leave a Reply

ALMATY/NOV. 25 (The Bulletin) –Kazakhstan wants to join a Russian project to increase gas supplies to China through a new pipeline, media reported by quoting Kazakh PM Askar Mamin.

China has become the biggest buyer of gas from Central Asia. It already buys most of Turkmenistan’s gas and Kazakhstan has been selling increasingly large volumes to China. Russia is due to start pumping gas through a new pipeline called The Power of Siberia to China on Dec. 2 and has already said that it is looking at options to build more gas pipelines running to China.

In comments to media, Mr Mamin said that Kazakhstan wanted The Power of Siberia-2 to run through its territory.

“Based on the environmental situation in the region, we are also considering the option of joining the future Power of Siberia-2 project,” he said. “Currently, gas prices are negotiated. We have offered Russia that (the pipeline) goes through Kazakhstan with an exit to the Chinese market.”

Gazprom signed a $400b deal in 2014 with China to supply 38b cubic metres of gas every year to China over the next 30 years.

ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.

Air Astana sets up route to Paris from Almaty

Leave a Reply

NOV. 25 (The Bulletin) — Air Astana, the Kazakh airline owned by Kazakhstan’s sovereign wealth fund Samruk Kazyna and BAE Systems, will replace its flight to Paris from Nur-Sultan with a new route from Almaty from June next year. The move may mark a shift back to Almaty acting as the main entry point into Kazakhstan for European airlines. A few years ago, when the government was trying to promote Astana, as Nur-Sultan was known, it insisted that flights should fly into the Kazakh capital.
ENDS

— This story was first published in issue 430 of the weekly Bulletin.