DEC. 8 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – At least 40 NGOs in Kyrgyzstan signed a petition urging Pres. Almazbek Atambayev to avoid signing into law a bill which will make overseas funding illegal, media reported. Mr Atambayev has previous said the law is important because it prevents foreign states from using NGOs to spy on Kyrgyzstan. The NGOs say the funding is a vital lifeline.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 5 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Perhaps in a push to boost investment from the Gulf States, Kyrgyzstan will open an embassy in Dubai. President Almazbek Atamabayev announced the opening of a new embassy while on a trip to the UAE. Kyrgyzstan has slowly been increasing its international presence over the past year.
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(News report from Issue No. 212, published on Dec. 10 2014)
DEC. 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The devaluation of the manat, the Kyrgyz currency, and slowing economic growth have combined to push inflation in Kyrgyzstan up to 8.5%, the World Bank said in a report quoted widely by local media. The World Bank also said that it expected inflation to keep rising towards 10%. This could mean social trouble.
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(News report from Issue No. 211, published on Dec. 3 2014)
NOV. 26 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan has invited companies to compete in a tender to build two hydropower stations, hydroworld.com, the industry new website, reported. The projects, supported by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), highlight how important hydropower is to Kyrgyzstan.
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(News report from Issue No. 211, published on Dec. 3 2014)
DEC. 1 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyz PM Djoomart Otorbayev said the country would sign treaties on Dec. 23 with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan that effectively amount to an accession agreement to the Kremlin-led Eurasian Economic Union at the start of 2015. Armenia has already signed an accession deal.
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(News report from Issue No. 211, published on Dec. 3 2014)
DEC. 2 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Under a deal thrashed out last month, Kazakhstan started supplying Kyrgyzstan with electricity, media reported. Kyrgyzstan has been desperate to secure electricity because of a dry summer that has left reservoirs feeding hydropower sites low on water.
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(News report from Issue No. 211, published on Dec. 3 2014)
NOV. 27 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kyrgyzstan’s prosecutor charged Melis Myrzakmatov, the once powerful mayor of Osh, for alleged corruption in a move linked to next year’s parliamentary election.
Mr Myrzakmatov, a nationalist, ruled Osh, Kyrgyzstan’s second city, with significant de facto autonomy from Bishkek between 2009 and 2013. He was eventually upseated by central government but last year he announced his intention to compete in parliamentary elections scheduled for autumn 2015.
The new corruption charges, so the theory goes, are designed to scupper these ambitions.
Kyrgyzstan’s General Prosecutor accused Mr Myrzakmatov of stealing $500,000 during the tender of a construction project for a bridge in Osh.
Mr Myrzakmatov has been one of the government’s most outspoken and formidable opponents. Such was his hold over Osh that he survived the political reshuffle after the country’s revolution in 2010 and ethnic violence between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in June of the same year.
Many Uzbeks suspect Mr Myrzakmatov played a role in instigating the ethnic violence to consolidate his control over Osh.
Mr Myrzakmatov’s party, Uluttar Birimdigi, which is not in the current parliament, would have been guaranteed strong support among Kyrgyz in Osh and elsewhere in the South. This would have complicated the electoral arithmetic for other dominant parties, including President Almazbek Atambayev’s Social Democratic Party of Kyrgyzstan.
Mr Myrzakmatov is being charged in absentia as his current whereabouts is unknown. Mr Atambayev launched a
‘war on corruption’ when he was inaugurated 2011. Most of the victims of this so-called appeared to be his political rivals.
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(News report from Issue No. 211, published on Dec. 3 2014)
NOV. 24 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – The local authorities in Kyrgyzstan have started a public education campaign to try to stop people from heading to Syria to join up with the extremist group Islamic State, media reported. Central Asian states have been alarmed at the increase in the number of recruits heading to Syria.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)
NOV. 25 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbek President Islam Karimov made a rare trip to Astana where he met Kazakh leader Nursultan Nazarbayev to discuss plans by Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan to build extra hydropower capacity, an issue that has threatened to destabilise the region. Uzbekistan relies on water from Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan to feed its important cotton fields.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)
NOV. 21 2014 (The Conway Bulletin) – Russia’s lower house of parliament passed a law that ratified deeper economic cooperation with Kyrgyzstan, part of the process towards Kyrgyz accession into the Kremlin-led Eurasian Economic Union (EaEU). The deal will mean a $1b windfall in cash and loans from Russia to Kyrgyzstan.
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(News report from Issue No. 210, published on Nov. 26 2014)