JAN. 22 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Valery Permyakov, a Russian conscript soldier, pleaded guilty to assaulting and killing a family of seven in the Armenian town of Gyumri last year. The murders triggered anti-Russia protests outside Russia’s military base, its biggest in the South Caucasus, and threatened to damage bilateral relations.
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(News report from Issue No. 265, published on Jan. 29 2016)
JAN. 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Hague-based International Criminal Court (ICC) officially launched an investigation into alleged war crimes during an eight day war in August 2008 between Georgia and Russia. Georgia, a signatory of the treaty which set up the ICC, said it would comply with the investigation. The ICC’s investigation has the potential to damage recently improved Georgia- Russia relations.
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(News report from Issue No. 265, published on Jan. 29 2016)
JAN. 21 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Khadija Ismayilova, a high-profile imprisoned Azerbaijani journalist, said that she had appointed Amal Clooney, the wife of Hollywood star George Clooney, as her lawyer ahead of a hearing in the European Court of Human Rights linked to her conviction this year on economic-related charges. Ismayilova is looking to challenge her conviction through the European Court. Europe and the West have accused Azerbaijan of cracking down on free speech.
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(News report from Issue No. 264, published on Jan. 22 2016)
JAN. 20 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbekistan is trying to recover up to $1m of assets frozen in bank accounts in Europe belonging to Gulnara Karimova, the eldest daughter of Uzbek president Islam Karimov, media reported. Ms Karimova has been under house arrest in Tashkent for nearly two years. She was once considered a potential successor to her father. Swiss authorities are investigating her for money laundering.
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(News report from Issue No. 264, published on Jan. 22 2016)
JAN. 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Policemen in the city of Ferghana told the Uzbek language service of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty that they are not receiving their full salaries. The information stream from Uzbekistan is weak but evidence has been growing that prices are rising and shortages of good growing. The Uzbek government has not commented.
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(News report from Issue No. 264, published on Jan. 22 2016)
JAN. 8 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Georgian president Giorgi Margvelashvili signed into law a redistricting of constitutional boundaries, part of a move in Georgia to do away with so-called majoritarian seats in parliament. Of Georgia’s 150-seat parliament, 103 are made up of majoritarian, although the size of these seats varies from 9,000 to 150,000 people. The redistricting is the first step in a process designed to even out this imbalance.
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(News report from Issue No. 263, published on Jan. 15 2016)
JAN. 14 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmen officials have started pulling cigarettes off shops’ shelves in what appears to be a draconian attempt to effectively ban smoking altogether.
In Ashgabat, an AFP correspondent interviewed a shopkeeper who said that officials had recently ordered him to stop selling cigarette or face a heavy fine.
“(They) came to our shop recently and forced us to remove cigarettes from the shelves, threatening us with huge fines,” 34-year-old Bairam Saryev said.
Turkmenistan’s President Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov is known for his eccentricity. He is a former dentist and hates smoking. The World Health Organisation (WHO) has praised his efforts to discourage smokers by banning smoking in all public buildings, parks and offices as well as cigarette advertising.
Last year WHO said only 8% of Turkmenistan’s population smoked, the lowest of any country.
The Turkmen government has not published any official announcement on whether it will ban smoking altogether.
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(News report from Issue No. 263, published on Jan. 15 2016)
DEC. 28 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – A court in Azerbaijan sentenced journalist Rauf Mirkadirov to six years in prison for spying for Armenia. Mirkadirov denies the charges. His supporters said that the jail sentence is more evidence of Azerbaijan’s crackdown on dissent and free speech. Azerbaijan has jailed several journalists over the past few years.
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(News report from Issue No. 262, published on Jan. 8 2016)
JAN. 5 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The trial of five men accused of killing journalist Rasim Aliyev in August has opened. Aliyev was beaten on the streets of a provincial Azerbaijani town and died in hospital. Before he died, he said supporters of international footballer Cavid Huseynov who he had criticised in a match report has attacked him. Mr Huseynov is not among the men standing trial for killing Aliyev.
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(News report from Issue No. 262, published on Jan. 8 2016)
DEC. 15 2015 (The Conway Bulletin) – A Swedish court sentenced Yury Zhukovsky, an Uzbek national, to 18 years in prison for the attempted murder of dissident Obid-kori Nazarov in February 2012, in a case that intensified attention on Uzbekistan’s human rights record.
The prosecutor in the trial accused the Uzbek government of ordering the murder of Mr Nazarov who had fled Uzbekistan to Sweden in 2006. He had been a popular cleric who preached against the government.
The judge, though, said that it was not possible to rule on who may have ordered the murder.
Zhukovsky was caught on CCTV camera in a shop in the remote northern town of Stromsund hours before Mr Nazarov was shot in the head with a revolver. Mr Nazarov survived the attempted murder but has been left with brain damage.
Human rights groups have criticised Uzbekistan record. They have said that the government pursues its enemies abroad.
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(News report from Issue No. 261, published on Dec. 20 2015)