Tag Archives: protest

Kazakh authorities accuse imprisoned businessman of coup attempt

SHYMKENT/Kazakhstan, JUNE 6 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — The authorities in Kazakhstan accused imprisoned Kazakh businessman Tokhtar Tuleshov of stirring protests across the country in April and May in an attempt to overthrow the government.

The protests morphed from a demonstration in Atyrau in the west of the country against proposed land reforms into country-wide demonstrations against the government and the worsening economic scenario.

President Nursultan Nazarbayev has already sacked a couple of ministers over the handling of the land reform issue as well as two senior interior ministry officials but some analysts said that he is still looking to deflect blame for the protests away from his government.

The National Security Committee have now said that Mr Tuleshov, who was arrested in Shymkent in the south of the country, in January on various corruption and gun running charges has been plotting for the past year to overthrow the government.

Quoting a National Security Committee spokesperson, media said that Tuleshov’s “plan included destabilising the situation in the country by creating flash points, organising protests and mass unrest.”

Over the weekend, police also arrested a deputy prosecutor-general and two senior military officers for involvement in the plan.

It’s not clear, though, how Tuleshov would have organised this from prison and other analysts were quick to rubbish the theory.

Rasul Zhumaly, a former Kazakh diplomat and now a political analyst, said that Tuleshov was too well-connected to the establishment to risk attempting a coup.

“He had powerful patrons in Russia and Kazakhstan, even among military representatives, and his activity in pro-Kremlin propaganda,” he said.

“It’s more likely that these official charges are nothing but an attempt to find a fall guy and make him responsible for everything.”

Tuleshov was based in Shymkent near the border with Uzbekistan. He was the representative of a Russia- linked military think tank in Kazakhstan and also the CEO of Shymkentpivo, one of the country’s biggest breweries.

In Shymkent, people said that Tuleshov had been targeted because officials coveted his business.

“Tokhtar had a big profitable busi- ness, his family had everything, so there was no need for him to go against current authorities,” said Galina, 38.

“It seems like his business was very attractive for someone.”

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 284, published on June 10 2016)

Person in the news: The Kazakh beer king

JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Tokhtar Tuleshov, a man known as the Kazakh Beer King who has a penchant for luxury watches and racehorses, has been accused of masterminding protests that spread across Kazakhstan in April and May. According to the authorities Mr Tuleshov was trying to stoke a coup d’etat.

The well-groomed, Mr Tuleshov, is a kingpin in Shymkent, a sprawling city on Kazakhstan’s south on the border with Uzbekistan. The city has something of a reputation of an ethnic melting pot and is home to a million or so Kazakhs and Uzbeks. It also has a reputation for cross border trade and smuggling and for having an air of the so-called ‘wild south’.

Mr Tuleshov revelled in this environment, building up a power base that may have threatened more established politicians in Astana. In a dramatic raid captured on mobile phone footage on Jan. 30 this year, armed police swooped on a hotel where Mr Tuleshov was hosting a meeting. They arrested him and four of his colleagues for alleged drug smuggling and gun running.

His Shymkentpivo brewery is one of the biggest in Kazakhstan, producing around 200m litres of beer every year, including the Shymentskoe brand, one of the most popular. He also has close links with the Russian parliament and was the official representative in Kazakhstan of the Centre for the Analysis of Terrorist Threats, a Moscow-based group. Kazakh news websites have also reported that Mr Tuleshov has bought a majority stake in Uzbekistan’s biggest juice producer.

Like other wealthy businessmen in Kazakhstan, Mr Tuleshov was careful to support causes favoured by the ruling elite. This involved being a fully paid-up member of President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s Nur Otan party and a benefactor of various boxing associations.

Mr Tuleshov was not afraid of showing off his wealth, often driving around Shymkent in a black Rolls Royce, inevitably followed by a convoy of bodyguards, and making pop videos released on YouTube of his wife and daughter’s extravagant birthdays.

All this is a world away from his prison cell where Mr Tuleshov has been languishing for nearly six months. By being accused of trying to organise a coup d’etat, Mr Tuleshov is effectively being cast as an enemy of the state, making his situation precarious – to say the least.

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(News report from Issue No. 284, published on June 10 2016)

Editorial: Kazakh coup charge

JUNE 10 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — If the Kazakh authorities are to be believed Tokhtar Tuleshov, a millionaire Kazakh who owns a major brewery in Shymkent, organised a series of protests across the country in April and May to try to incite a revolution.

He did this, apparently, while in jail. Mr Tuleshov has been in pre-trial detention since the end of January when he was arrested for alleged drug and gun running offences.

And he apparently picked Atyrau, a town hundreds of kilometres away near the Caspian Sea, to kick-start his coup attempt before organising protests in other cities.

These charges lack credibility. How could Mr Tuleshov have organised these demonstrations from his prison cell? Would Mr Tuleshov even have had the influence to organise a rally in Atyrau in mid-April? He has strong local support in Shymkent but this support is unlikely to spread to Atyrau.

It’s plausible that disgruntled members of the Kazakh elite may have organised the initial protests in Atyrau against land reforms that spread but the government needs to present more evidence to back this up.

ENDS

(Editorial from Issue No. 284, published on June 10 2016)

Land commission dampens protests in Kazakhstan

ALMATY, JUNE 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Activists in Kazakhstan said President Nursultan Nazarbayev’s move to defer changes to the land code until next year and set up a commission to improve dialogue with ordinary people was a positive step, although frustrations over the economy still lingered.

Proposed changes to the land code, that would have given foreigners more rights to own and lease land, sparked a protest in Atyrau in April. Those protests then spread across Kazakhstan, taking on a more general anti-government flavour although the land reform issue was still a key concern.

In Kazakhstan, analysts have said, it is difficult for ordinary people to protest directly against the government. Police detained hundreds of protesters on May 21 ahead of planned anti-government demonstrations.

Instead it is easier to protest against a single issue, such as land reforms, and use this to channel grievances over a stalling economy, job losses and a currency devaluation.

At press conference in Almaty, Mukhtar Taizhan, a high profile opposition activist who has been appointed to the land reform commission, said that Kazakhstan’s society was still riven through with tension over the economy.

“The work of commission does not eliminate increasing tensions in our economy,” he said. “If we want stability, we need to change our economic politics urgently.”

Other activists interviewed by the Conway Bulletin’s Kazakhstan correspondent agreed. Saken, an activist said: “There will be no mass protests in the near future because the land commission has softened the current situation.”

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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)

Pro-government protesters target US consulate in Kazakh city

ALMATY, MAY 31 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Roughly two dozen people protested in front of the US consulate in Almaty against what they said was the influence of foreign governments in demonstrations across Kazakhstan since April.

Most of the people at the protest were the same protagonists who had staged demonstrations against banks earlier in the year. The impression was that a group with close links to the authorities had organised the protest to show support for the government. And in contrast to anti- government protests on May 21, police didn’t intervene.

Zhanna Sadykova, a leader of the so-called Give People Housing movement, said one of the demonstrators’ targets were protests against the Kazakh government in the US last week.

“Those who protested in US cities are not citizens of our country and therefore have no right to interfere with our internal policies,” she said.

The protests that have swept Kazakhstan since April have been unprecedented. What started as an isolated protest against land reforms has morphed into a general gripe against the government and the country’s stagnating economy.

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(News report from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)

Editorial: Pro-government demonstrations in Kazakhstan

JUNE 3 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — A pro-government protest demonstrating against anti-government protests is not a new practice in Central Asia.

This was the scenario in Kazakhstan this week and even if it might not be a new issue but it is still an insightful one. The authorities are getting increasingly worried that their opponents are gaining in strength.

The main targets of the pro-government protest this week were the US consulate in Almaty and expatriate Kazakhs in San Francisco and New York.

The pro-government protesters, well organised and clearly linked to the authorities, accused the US of stirring anti-government feelings, a standard complaint by former Soviet governments facing popular discontent. They also denounced the protesters in the US as traitors who didn’t understand how loved President Nursultan Nazarbayev was in Kazakhstan.

But rather than criticise the protesters in the US and the US consulate in Almaty, perhaps it would be more effective for the authorities in Kazakhstan to listen to their critics.

ENDS

(Editorial from Issue No. 283, published on June 3 2016)

Kazakh police detain hundreds before anti-government protests

ALMATY, MAY 21 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Perhaps betraying the authorities’ nervousness that anti- government demonstrations are gaining momentum, police in Kazakhstan detained hundreds of people ahead of planned protests against land reforms and worsening economic conditions.

The scale of the arrests showed just how much support the protests have gathered.

What started as an isolated demonstration in Atyrau, western Kazakhstan, in mid-April against proposed reforms to the land code, which would have allowed foreigners more rights, has now morphed into more general outpouring of discontent against the government.

In Almaty, police wearing black balaclavas detained people before they could reach a planned demonstration in the central square. In Astana, and other cities across the country, police detained smaller numbers of people.

Anti-government demonstrations are rare in Kazakhstan but ordinary Kazakhs, frustrated with worsening economic conditions brought on by a collapse in oil prices and a recession in Russia, have latched onto the land reform issue as a channel for their discontent. Even a pledge earlier this month by President Nursultan Nazarbayev to defer the land reforms has not quashed the protests.

Rinat, a protester in Astana, explained the protesters’ frustrations. “I do not want a change of power, a revolution or a war,” he told the Bulletin’s correspondent.

“I just want the authorities to hear public opinion, conduct fair elections so that the generation of my children can live without loans and be sure of their future.”

These complaints were echoed across the country. “It is not the issue of nationalism, separatism or about outside influences,” said Sergei, a protester in Atyrau. “It is about distrust in the administration that hasn’t done anything good for the economy for a long period of time.”

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(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

Editorial: Kazakh demonstrations

MAY 27 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) — Make no mistake, the protests in Kazakhstan are no longer about land reform issues – they are almost entirely focused on ordinary Kazakhs’ frustrations with the elite and their government.

For nearly two years Kazakhs have watched as their economic outlook and livelihoods have worsened. Never mind what President Nursultan Nazarbayev says about Kazakhs never having had it so good. For ordinary Kazakhs it doesn’t feel that way.

The mass arrests last week ahead of planned protests are an indication of just how worried the authorities are over the groundswell of anti-government feelings. Mr Nazarbayev and his advisers look out of touch. They sit in their Ivory Towers while police wearing black balaclavas chase demonstrators around the streets. This doesn’t give the impression of being in control.

This year, the Kazakh authorities have clamped down on the press and forced through a snap election. Despite these heavy-handed tactics, they still don’t look fully in control.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 282, published on May 27 2016)

People protest in Georgian mine

MAY 13 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Residents of Ieli, a small village in the Svaneti region in the north of Georgia, demonstrated against a gold mining company that had started excavation work in the area. Dozens of protesters said that they didn’t believe that Optical System, a St Kitts and Nevis-based company, had a valid licence. The local government later showed that the company had been given an exploration licence in 2005.

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(News report from Issue No. 281, published on May 20 2016)

UN condemns clampdown in Kazakhstan

MAY 12 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The UN High Commissioner for Human Rights condemned what it said was the Kazakh authorities crackdown on protests against proposed amendments to the land code. “The government must immediately end all forms of persecution and take effective measures to protect civil society,” it said. The protests forced Pres. Nursultan Nazarbayev to delay planned changes to the land code. Mobile recordings of the protests showed police clashing with demonstrators.

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(News report from Issue No. 280, published on May 13 2016)