Tag Archives: politics

BBC interviews Uzbek president’s daughter

SEPT. 27 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — While Gulnara Karimova, eldest daughter of Uzbek President Islam Karimov, enjoys dabbling in politics and releasing pop videos, her sister Lola is, apparently, happiest at home with her family in their mortgaged house in Geneva.

That was the message, at least from Lola Karimova-Tillyaeva in a rare email interview with BBC on Sept. 27.

Ms Karimova-Tillyaeva also said that she hadn’t spoke to her elder sister for 12 years.

“All the information about my sister, I get from the foreign media, including the BBC website,” she said.

Gulnara Karimova is often touted as a potential successor to her father who has been president of Uzbekistan since the 1991 collapse of the Soviet Union. By contrast, Ms Karimova-Tillyaeva said her main interest was her three children and husband Timur Tillyaev.

Ms Karimova-Tillyaeva also said that she was surprised to read in the Swiss press that she was one of the richest people in the country. Her husband, she said, ran a logistics company and they took a mortgage to buy their house which cost a reported $46m.

Two years ago, Ms Karimova-Tillyaeva lost a libel case against a French website that had described her as a dictator’s daughter.

ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)

Newspaper editor jailed in Azerbaijan

SEPT. 27 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Azerbaijan handed a five year prison sentence for possessing drugs, inciting hatred and treason to Hilal Mamedov, editor of the Talyshi Sado newspaper, a Talysh-language newspaper in the south of the country.

International human rights and media lobbyists said Azerbaijani authorities were using the courts to lock up the editors of newspaper that didn’t suit their agenda.

“I am saddened to see that the hostile environment for free media in Azerbaijan has not improved but is rather growing, as yet another journalist has received a lengthy prison sentence today,” said Dunja Mijatovic, the media representative for the OSCE, Europe’s governance lobby group.

The authorities have said that Hilal Mamedov was trying to destabilise the country. They have long been suspicious of the Talysh minority, a group of roughly 100,000 people who live along the border with Iran. The interior ministry has released a statement accusing Mamedov of undermining Azerbaijan’s security with inflammatory articles in the newspaper. It also accused him of spying for Iran.

Five years ago the then-editor of Talyshi Sado, Novruzali Mamedov (no relation to Hilal Mamedov) was also imprisoned on similar charges. He died in prison. Media groups said that he had been denied adequate medical treatment.

Azerbaijan has a poor media rights record and in her statement, the OSCE’s Ms Mijatovic said this was worsening in the run up to the Oct. 9 presidential election.

Ms Mijatovic may be right. Opposition journalists in Baku have been harassed and imprisoned while pro-government journalists have received new apartments.

Hilal Mamedov’s imprisonment is different, though, and it should be viewed as part of the dispute between the Talysh and the Azerbaijani state rather than through central politics.

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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)

Bobonazarova runs for president in Tajikistan

OCT. 2 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tajikistan’s main opposition surprised observers by picking a female human rights activist to be its candidate in a presidential election scheduled for November, media reported. Oynihol Bobonazarova is the first woman to run in a presidential election in Tajikistan. President Emomali Rakhmon is guaranteed a win.

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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)

Kazakhstan’s cityscapes continue to change

KARAGANDA/Kazakhstan, OCT. 2 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A towering statue of former Soviet leader Vladimir Lenin once stood in the main square in Karaganda, an industrial city in central Kazakhstan.

Three years ago Karaganda’s government moved the Lenin statue to a windblown spot on the edge of the city and replaced it with a dazzling white column adorned with a golden eagle and a sun.

The displacement of Lenin fits a wider trend in Kazakhstan — the sweeping away of the symbols of the Soviet past in favour of Kazakh icons.

The new monument in Karaganda is similar to the Kazakh Country monument in Astana, one of many landmarks projecting a national identity.

The Kazakh elite, led by President Nursultan Nazarbayev, has adopted a number of symbols to help propel their narrative. The most obvious are the yurt, a spherical felt home of the nomads, and the samruk, a mythical phoenix-like bird, as well as the horse and the eagle.

Another ubiquitous symbol is the shanyrak, the circular wooden top of the yurt, with its distinctive criss-cross pattern that symbolises home, hearth and family happiness.

Just outside Karaganda, a museum in the village of Dolinka commemorates victims of Soviet political repression. This was once the biggest Soviet gulag in Kazakhstan.

Poignantly, at the entrance is a broken shanyrak representing Kazakhs killed by Soviet repression.

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(Correspondent’s Notebook from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)

Georgia’s PM creates a new private equity fund

SEPT. 30 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — It can be useful having a billionaire as your PM.

This year foreign direct investment in Georgia has slumped. This is bad news for Georgian PM Bidzina Ivanishvili who pledged that FDI would increase after he won a parliamentary election last October. It’s bad news also for the Georgia; FDI is a major cornerstone of the economy.

In September, Georgia’s foreign minister, Nodar Khaduri, said FDI this year would probably be around $1b, half the initial estimate.

Political instability is likely the main cause of foreigners’ reticence to invest. A presidential election, that could be genuinely destabilising, is set for Oct. 27.

So, Mr Ivanishvili has come up with a solution. On Sept. 30 he announced a $6b private equity fund that would invest in the country. He personally will, reportedly, pledge $1b to the fund. The other main investors are Dhabi Group and Ras Al Khaimah Investment Authority (RAKIA) as well as Turkish, Chinese and Kazakh investment funds.

Of the $6b, half will be invested in the energy sector and the rest in manufacturing and tourism.

Coming less than a month before the election, this is a clever ploy from Mr Ivanishvili. Time will tell, though, whether the fund is just a vote winner or a genuine investment vehicle.

ENDS
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(News report from Issue No. 154, published on Oct. 2 2013)

Presidential candidates confirmed in Georgia

SEPT. 23 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Georgia’s central election commission confirmed that 23 people had registered for its Oct. 27 presidential election. The two main contenders are Giorgi Margvelashvili from PM Bidzina Ivanishvili’s Georgian Dream coalition and David Bakradze from President Mikheil Saakashvili’s United National Movement party.

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(News report from Issue No. 153, published on Sept. 25 2013)

Former Armenian candidate tried for murder

SEPT. 23 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A court in Yerevan sentenced Vardan Sedrakian, a candidate in a presidential election in February, to jail for trying to assassinate a rival. Gunmen shot and injured Paruyr Hayrikian, also a presidential candidate, a few weeks before the election on Feb. 18. The attempted assassination nearly delayed the vote.

(News report from Issue No. 153, published on Sept. 25 2013)

Newspaper is suspended and politician retires in Kazakhstan

SEPT. 23 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Early on Sept. 19 news started to filter through to Almaty’s small opposition intelligentsia that Bulat Abilov, one of their more charismatic leaders, was retiring.

At 56-years-old this could have some as a surprise, instead there was a knowing understanding.

Being an active opposition leader in Kazakhstan, even if you’re not a militant one, is exhausting. You’re increasingly marginalised and harassed. This has intensified since violence in the town of Zhanaozen, western Kazakhstan, in December 2011. At least 15 people died in fighting in Zhanaozen between police and demonstrators.

It appears as if Mr Abilov, a wealthy businessman, had just had enough.

A few days later, on Sept. 23, a court in Almaty suspended the Kazakh-language Ashyq Alan (Tribune) newspaper for three months. Its transgression was not to publish between July 10 and Aug. 21. Apparently this was in breach of its licence.

Ashyq Alan, a new weekly newspaper, is considered a critic of the government. Newspapers are not particularly influential in Kazakhstan, the readership numbers are too low, but suspending Ashyq Alan still resonates. Last year, the authorities suspended or closed a handful of opposition newspapers.

In the past week, dissenting voices in Kazakhstan have become even less audible.

(News report from Issue No. 153, published on Sept. 25 2013)

Kazakh opposition leader quits

SEPT. 18 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — Bulat Abilov, a relatively high-profile opposition leader in Kazakhstan, announced that he was retiring from politics. His decision is a blow to the increasingly marginalised opposition. Mr Abilov, a wealthy businessman, was considered a moderate.

(News report from Issue No. 153, published on Sept. 25 2013)

Election debate turns into chaos in Azerbaijan

SEPT. 20 2013 (The Conway Bulletin) — A TV debate between nine of the 10 people standing in Azerbaijan’s presidential election descended into farce when pro-president candidates shouted insults at Camil Hasanli, the only genuine opposition figure. Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev, standing for re-election, didn’t take part in the debate.

(News report from Issue No. 153, published on Sept. 25 2013)