Tag Archives: society

Editorial: Tajik students

FEB. 26 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Imitation is, they say, the most sincere form of flattery. So is flattery what Tajik officials had in mind when they organised a series of student protests against diplomatic missions of the European Union, the OSCE and Turkey in Dushanbe and Khujand? Or perhaps they were just thinking about the intimidation they wanted to inflict on diplomats?

They deny any link to the student protests, but in Tajikistan people are controlled and a protest outside a foreign embassy couldn’t have happened without the support of the authorities.

Ten years ago, the Russian state spawned a youth movement called Nashi. It was well-funded, well-organised and vicious. When it was given a target it went into attack mode. Just ask ambassadors from Western countries they targeted or the democracy advocates they harassed.

It appears as if Tajik officials now want to achieve something similar, although on a smaller scale. They want to intimidate Turkey and the European Union into giving up opposition members who have fled Tajikistan. Nashi’s own results were, in the end, mixed and the Tajik students’ won’t be any better.

ENDS

(Editorial from Issue No. 269, published on Feb. 26 2016)

Turkmen President pardons prisoners

FEB. 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Turkmen president Kurbanguly Berdymukhamedov pardoned nearly 1,500 prisoners to mark National Flag Day, media reported. The gesture is fairly well-used by Mr Berdymukhamedov who likes to portray himself as a powerful, benign father-figure. Rights groups, though, accuse him of presiding over a regime as repressive as his predecessor Saparmurat Niyazov.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 269, published on Feb. 26 2016)

Electricity price to rise in Armenia

FEB. 25 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Armenia’s Public Services Regulatory Commission (PSRC) approved a 1.5b dram ($3m) investment in its Soviet-era nuclear power plant Metsamor. Also at the press conference, the PSRC chairman, Shiraz Kirakosyan, said the controversial issue of raising electricity prices would be revisited in April. Last year proposed electricity price rises triggered street protests.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 269, published on Feb. 26 2016)

Uzbek companies fail salaries

FEB. 19 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Companies in Uzbekistan are failing to pay staff their full salaries, eurasianet.org reported quoting figures from a state agency that showed fines totalling $500m being handed out for failing to pay salaries on time. This could be, eurasianet.org reported, a sign that worsening economic conditions are hitting Uzbekistan.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 269, published on Feb. 26 2016)

Dozens protest for jailed Kazakh PM

FEB. 17 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Around a dozen protesters in Astana demanded the release from prison of Kazakhstan’s former PM Serik Akhmetov, who is serving a 10-year sentence for corruption. Protests in Kazakhstan, especially supporting former high-ranking officials who have been imprisoned for corruption, are rare.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 268, published on Feb. 19 2016)

Kazakh Riot police steps in

FEB. 15/16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Riot police in the southern Kazakh region of Zhambyl broke up a potential race riot after ethnic Kazakhs accused Turks of murdering a 16-year-old boy. Video from the confrontation showed police in full body armour with dogs trying to separate a group of people who had gathered around a house in the village of Burylov. The incident highlights the fragile social spectrum in regional Kazakhstan just as the economy worsens.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 268, published on Feb. 19 2016)

Carrefour opens first store in Kazakhstan

FEB. 16 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev toured a newly-opened Carrefour supermarket in Almaty in a publicity stunt aimed at showing that despite a collapse in both oil prices and the tenge, Kazakhstan’s economy was still prospering.

Instead, though, the video of the Mr Nazarbayev’s walk-about appeared to betray how out-of-touch he was with ordinary people.

“Why are these called dirty,” Mr Nazarbayev said pointing at a pile of unwashed root vegetables – possibly carrots, possibly potatoes. “These are normal.”

Carrefour’s Kazakhstan director, Stephane Maurier, who was walking around the supermarket with Nazarbayev, explained. “We have clean and dirty,” he said.

Mr Nazarbayev, though, wasn’t impressed. “These are better than the clean ones,” he said and again pointed at the unwashed vegetables. “You don’t know what they are washed with.”

Things didn’t improve when Mr Nazarbayev, looking stiff in his tailored suit but smiling and apparently enjoying his trip to the supermarket, visited other sections.

He said the bananas were not ripe enough, told Mr Maurier croissants were unhealthy and dangerous and had to clarify with an elderly woman shopping for bread that 70 tenge ($0.2) was an average price for a loaf.

This particular Carrefour was located in the Grand Park shopping centre in Almaty. The franchise holder is Dubai-based Majid Al Futtaim Group which operates other Carrefour shops around the world.

It was the first of nine planned stores that Carrefour wants to open in Kazakhstan. Five of the stores will be located in Almaty; four in Astana.

The opening of the Carrefour stores will give Kazakhstan’s battered economy a boost, create hundreds of jobs and hand Mr Nazarbayev more photo-ops in supermarkets.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 268, published on Feb. 19 2016)

Uzbek President expresses homophobia

FEB. 8 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbek President Islam Karimov said “Western values” were the cause of “vulgar” practices, such as homosexual relations. Speaking to Uzbek press, Mr Karimov, 78, said that homosexuality for him was a form of a mental illness. Homosexuality is illegal in Uzbekistan and can be punished with up to three years in prison. Human rights groups regularly rate Uzbekistan as one of the most oppressive countries in the world.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 267, published on Feb. 12 2016)

Kazakh President tells people not to panic

JAN 29 2016, ALMATY (The Conway Bulletin) — At a televised conference for his Nur Otan political party, a stony faced Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev played down a 50% drop in the value of the tenge currency and told viewers to look at the economic positives.

Mr Nazarbayev likes to act the elder father figure during times of economic and political strife in Kazakhstan and with oil prices at a 12- year-low, government spending being cut and inflation rising, Mr Nazarbayev clearly thought it was time to calm the increasingly jittering nerves of his countrymen.

“We have been living with $30 per barrel oil for half a year now and nothing has happened. We will overcome (this) and maybe we should get used to this, I think it has come here to stay,” he told the 2,000 assembled delegates.

Kazakh officials know that they are treading a thin line and are eager to head off any sign of discontent.

In Azerbaijan, unease at the economic malaise triggered several clashes between protesters and police in regional towns last month but in Kazakhstan, the authorities have been able to dampen public frustration.

Judging the public mood — when to be firm and when to be conciliatory — is a key skill during this time of economic hardship and one that Mr Nazarbayev has previously shown that he is adept at.

Last month, Mr Nazarbayev called a parliamentary election for March, 18 months early. Analysts said that this had been arranged so that Mr Nazarbayev and his officials could hold an election now, before the economic situation worsened further.

At the Nur Otan conference, though, Mr Nazarbayev avoided mention of the election and instead told Kazakhs that the government was working hard to look after them.

“We support our working population through implementation of the Employment Roadmap-2020 Program. There is no place for unemployment in Kazakhstan. We have all resources in place to avoid it,” he said.

Official unemployment figures in Kazakhstan are considered unreliable. Correspondents in Kazakhstan, though, and reports from various regional towns suggest that people are losing their jobs.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)

Kazakh mortgage holders protest

FEB. 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Around 50 mortgage holders protested in Almaty because they said it was not possible to repay their debt after a devaluation of the tenge. This was the third protest by mortgage holders against banks this year, a rare sustained level of public discontent in Kazakhstan. The tenge has lost around 50% of its value. Last year, the Kazakh government gave banks $130m to refinance mortgages but protesters have said that more needs to be done. Analysts have said that one of the biggest issues the Kazakh government faces is growing consumer debt.

ENDS

(News report from Issue No. 266, published on Feb. 5 2016)