FEB. 9 2012 (The Conway Bulletin) – France’s defence minister, Gerard Longuet, told the magazine L’Orient Le-Jour that NATO’s logistics route through Central Asia is too expensive. NATO has earmarked the route, dubbed the Northern Distribution Network, as the best way of withdrawing soldiers and kit in 2014 from Afghanistan.
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(News report from Issue No. 77, published on Feb. 16 2012)
FEB. 1 2012 (The Conway Bulletin) – Media freedom rankings by the France-based NGO Reporters Without Borders reflect another tough year for local journalists in Central Asia and the South Caucasus.
Turkmenistan retains its standard position at the bottom of the 179-country list, just above North Korea and Eritrea, underlining its reputation as one of the world’s most repressive states. Twenty places above Turkmenistan is Uzbekistan, also in familiar territory.
But this year, between Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan, sliding 10 places to 162nd is Azerbaijan.
In 2011, the authorities in Azerbaijan quashed anti-government protests and imprisoned journalists and bloggers. In November a prominent Azerbaijani journalist was also murdered in Baku.
Reporters Without Borders called Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev a “predator” of the media.
“Violence is back in a big way there, with threats, beatings and abduction of opposition journalists,” the report said.
The report was compiled between Dec. 1 2010 and Nov. 30 2011, before the Kazakh authorities’ crackdown on media after riots in the west of the country.
Even so, Kazakhstan comes in at 154th position and looks set to slip in the next rankings.
Armenia enjoys the most media freedom in the region. In 77th position it has regained ground lost after opposition protests and a state-of-emergency in 2008.
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(News report from Issue No. 75, published on Feb. 2 2012)
JAN. 24 2012 (The Conway Bulletin) – Police in Tajikistan detained several high-profile anti-narcotics officials for allegedly helping drug smugglers dodge the security services, local media reported. The arrests highlight the extent of corruption in Tajikistan and the collusion between the drug runners and senior officials.
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(News report from Issue No. 74, published on Jan. 26 2012)
JAN. 18 2012 (The Conway Bulletin) – In its annual growth forecasts, the World Bank said weakening markets in the West would hit the developing world in 2012. For 2012 growth forecasts for Central Asia and the South Caucasus were: Tajikistan 6%, Kyrgyzstan 5.5%, Kazakhstan 5.5%, Uzbekistan 8%, Turkmenistan N/A, Azerbaijan 3.1%, Georgia 5%, Armenia 4.3%.
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(News report from Issue No. 73, published on Jan. 19 2012)
JAN. 13 2012 (The Conway Bulletin) – Languishing on the Tajik-Uzbek border are dozens of railway wagons laden with food, fuel and building material bound for Tajikistan. There are plenty of potential flashpoints in Central Asia, but this backlog of railway wagons is potentially one of the most dangerous.
The Tajik authorities say that the Uzbeks are deliberately stopping the wagons from completing their journey and that this threatens to trigger a famine.
The Uzbeks counter that an important bridge which crosses the border has been washed away and it is not possible for the wagons to enter Tajikistan.
This bickering is not new. Relations between Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have been strained for most of the region’s 20 year post-Soviet history. At the source of the tension is the countries’ interlinked water-energy dynamic. While the Tajik Pamir Mountains provide vital water for Uzbek agriculture and industry, Uzbekistan provides power and transport links for Tajikistan.
But recently, to the frustration of Uzbekistan, Tajikistan (with Iranian help) has been building new dams across a major river.
The dams change the relationship between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan. They will reduce Tajikistan’s reliance on Uzbekistan for its power and, importantly, also increase its control of water supply to downstream Uzbekistan.
There are other issues to add to this combustible mix including US transport contracts and personal animosity between the countries’ leaders. All this make the railway wagons on the Uzbek-Tajik border an issue to watch.
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(News report from Issue No. 72, published on Jan. 13 2012)
JAN. 4 2012 (The Conway Bulletin) – Local media quoted the head of the Tajik foreign ministry’s information department, Daviat Nazri, saying Uzbekistan had cut off gas to Tajikistan. The Uzbek authorities have not commented. Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have been locked in a protracted row about energy and food supplies.
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(News report from Issue No. 71, published on Jan. 5 2012)
DEC. 14 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Tajikistan faces a food shortage unless food rail wagons delayed in Uzbekistan are able to complete their journey, local media quoted the head of the World Food Programme (WFP) in Dushanbe, Alzira Ferreira, as saying. Tajik-Uzbek relations have worsened over the past year. Uzbekistan says a broken bridge has delayed the wagons.
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(News report from Issue No. 70, published on Dec. 22 2011)
NOV. 30 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Rafiq Tagi, a 61-year-old widely respected Azerbaijani journalist, died of stab wounds in a Baku hospital on Nov. 23, four days after an unknown assailant attacked him.
He wrote articles critical of both the state and hard line Islam. Muslim extremists, though, are suspected of organising Tagi’s murder.
Whether or not the authorities or Muslim extremists are the main threat, for local journalists the former Soviet South Caucasus and Central Asia states are often both difficult and dangerous to report on.
In Turkmenistan police this year tracked down and imprisoned journalists who reported on an explosion at an arms depot. In Uzbekistan most local correspondents from international news agencies have been chased out and in Tajikistan the BBC’s reporter was jailed.
Southern Kyrgyzstan remains dangerous for ethnic Uzbek journalists and in Kazakhstan in October attackers armed with baseball bats and a gun beat a camera crew covering protests in the west of the country against the state oil company.
A 2010 press freedom index compiled by the US-based NGO Reporters Without Borders scored the countries of the South Caucasus and Central Asia poorly. Armenia, Georgia and Tajikistan ranked slightly better but Kyrgyzstan, Kazakhstan, Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan were in the bottom quarter of the index.
The report card for 2011 may well be even worse.
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(News report from Issue No. 67, published on Dec. 1 2011)
NOV. 29 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Petrol prices in Tajikistan, a key price to watch for inflation and social tension, have risen sharply in the last few days, the state anti-monopoly agency told local media. The official said the suspension of a railway line in Uzbekistan because of a suspected bomb attack had hit supplies.
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(News report from Issue No. 67, published on Dec. 1 2011)
NOV. 22 2011 (The Conway Bulletin) – Authorities in Tajikistan used a presidential amnesty to release two ethnic Russian pilots imprisoned for smuggling. The jail sentences had infuriated Moscow and, seemingly in retaliation, immigration officials had deported hundreds of Tajiks for not having work permits.
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(News report from Issue No. 66, published on Nov. 23 2011)