JULY 8 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — More than 200 workers at a subcontractor for oil fields service company Cape International Plc and Manpower Ltd in Atyrau, west Kazakhstan, went on strike for two days over job losses, media quoted the local prosecutor-general’s office as saying. The workers are employed on the Kashagan oil project in the Caspian Sea.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 143, published on July 15 2013)
DEC. 18 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Riots that have killed at least 16 people in western Kazakhstan are a major challenge to the Kazakh elite.
It was, to put it simply, the biggest display of public discontent with the country’s leaders since independence in 1991.
The authorities have since imposed a state of emergency in the town of Zhanaozen, the centre of the fighting, and flooded the region with military. Protests have now taken root in Aktau, a major nearby oil centre, although there are so far no reports of violence.
Their strategy is simple. They aim to stop protests spreading to cities outside the western region of Mangistau. If they can’t, then the outlook for 2012 is decidedly bumpy.
The authorities’ reaction to the riots was insightful. It felt Soviet. They simply crushed the former oil workers who had occupied the main square in Zhanaozen since mid-May.
The statements that followed were dripping in Soviet language. According to President Nursultan Nazarbayev, the riots were started by selfish bandits and hooligans and the police had fired on them only when they feared for their lives. Reading it felt like 1986.
The bottom line is that in two consecutive civil disorder scenarios, police fired live rounds at protesters and killed several people.
Kazakhstan has prided itself on being an island of stability in volatile post-Soviet Central Asia. That image is looking distinctly battered.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 70, published on Dec. 22 2011)
DEC. 16 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Unprecedented riots broke out in Zhanaozan, west Kazakhstan, on Independence Day. At least 15 people died in fighting between ex-oil workers and police, who opened fire on protesters. The next day rioting spread to another town where police also shot at protesters killing one and injuring 11.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 70, published on Dec. 22 2011)
OCT. 26 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Kazakh independent internet TV channel Stan TV said four men armed with baseball bats and a gun attacked two of its journalists in western Kazakhstan. The journalists had been reporting on the stand-off between oil workers and a subsidiary of the state oil and gas company Kazmunaigas.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 63, published on Nov. 1 2011)
OCT. 24 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Around a third of the 450 workers at Armenia’s nuclear power station stopped work for three days over a pay dispute, triggering safety concerns at the plant. They returned to work after the government agreed a 10% pay rise. The Soviet-era Metsamor nuclear plant produces around 40% of Armenia’s power.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 62, published on Oct. 25 2011)
AUG. 9 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – A closed court in Aktau, west Kazakhstan, jailed for six years a lawyer who advised striking oil workers. Natalia Sokolova was convicted of “inciting civil disorder” and also banned from practising as a lawyer for three years after her release. Human rights groups said the sentence was incompatible with Kazakhstan’s commitment to free speech.
ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 52, published on Aug. 10 2011)
JULY 5 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Workers’ rights, the energy business and rock music are mixing into a potent concoction in Kazakhstan.
British pop star Sting stepped into the row between striking oil workers and Kazakhstan’s business elite when he cancelled a concert in support of a six-week long strike. Sting’s concert had been planned for Astana on July 4 as part of Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s birthday celebrations.
Cancelling it handed the oil workers a massive publicity coup and Nazarbayev a very public snub.
On his website Sting, former frontman of the 1970s/1980s rock band The Police, said: “Hunger strikes, imprisoned workers and tens of thousands on strike represents a virtual picket line which I have no intention of crossing.”
Perhaps Sting also had in mind the criticism he took last year after playing for the daughter of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, a man western human rights groups accuse of abuses.
The Kazakh strikers are mainly from Ozenmunaigas, a subsidiary of the state energy company Kazmunaigas in Kazakhstan’s energy producing western hinterland. They say they are not being paid enough. The authorities and Kazmunaigas have declared the strike illegal and arrested some of the workers’ leaders but they have failed to pressure them back to work.
Strikes in Kazakhstan are rare. This one though has already forced KMG EP, the London-listed arm of Kazmunaigas, to reduce its 2011 production forecast by 4% and looks set to rumble on.
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(News report from Issue No. 47, published on July 6 2011)
JUNE 28 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – The London-listed subsidiary of Kazakhstan’s state oil company, KMG EP, reduced its 2011 oil production target by 4% because of strikes in the west of the country. Hundreds of oil workers have been on strike for a month over pay.
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(News report from Issue No. 46, published on June 28 2011)