Tag Archives: Uzbekistan

Uzbekistan plans bank sale

APRIL 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Uzbek government said it is ready to sell off its stakes in two commercial banks, part of a privatisation programme adopted in February. The government said it estimates its 47.6% stake in Aloka Bank to be worth $42.7m and its 63.1% stake in Turon Bank to be worth $29.7m. The government needs to raise cash and also wants to portray Uzbekistan as an investment-friendly economy.

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(News report from Issue No. 277, published on April 22 2016)

Uzbek authorities comment on high speed train

APRIL 15 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Uzbek government said its high-speed train link from Tashkent to Bukhara, one of its headline projects, will be completed in August. The government has said that the rail link will cost around $400m to complete. It has partnered with European businesses such as Spain’s Talgo and France’s Alstom to build it. Once completed, the railway line will halve the travel time from Tashkent to Bukhara to around 3-1/2 hours.

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(News report from Issue No. 277, published on April 22 2016)

Uzbek authorities release Karimov critic

APRIL 18 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Uzbek authorities released from prison Shukhrat Nusratov, a former MP who criticised President Islam Karimov in the first few years of Uzbekistan’s independence from the Soviet Union in 1991. Mr Nusratov had been jailed for seven years in 2012 for various economic crimes that his supporters said were fabricated.

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(News report from Issue No. 277, published on April 22 2016)

Vital car sales to Russia start to grow for GM Uzbekistan

APRIL 13 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Sales of GM Uzbekistan cars to Russia recorded their second consecutive monthly increase, raising hopes that the car-making industry in Central Asia has reached a turning point and pulled away from the low it hit in January.

If data next month shows another monthly increase in GM Uzbekistan’s sales to Russia, it will be the first time since September 2013 that the biggest car manufacturer in Central Asia will have recorded three months of con- secutive growth.

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(News report from Issue No. 276, published on April 15 2016)

Aeroflot launches flights to Uzbek capital

APRIL 1 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Russian flagship carrier Aeroflot said it is introducing an eight weekly link to Tashkent, a modification of its earlier summer schedule. The new flights will start on June 2, every Thursday from Moscow Sheremetyevo.

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(News report from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)

Editorial: Uzbek buses

APRIL 8 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – People in Uzbekistan will find it harder to pay both their utility bills and bus fares from this month.

The government has ordered price increases across the board from April 1, signalling latent inflation in its economy.

Utility prices went up around 8.5% but bus prices have risen by 20% and this is going to be significant. Public transport in Tashkent delivers several hundreds thousand passenger journeys every day, making bus ticket prices a highly sensitive issue.

The city government blamed high fuel prices for the new ticket price of 1,200 sum ($0.41 at the official rate).

Officially, the Uzbek sum has lost only 10% of its value over the past six months against the US dollar, but Black Market rates tell a different story.

The Uzbek currency is spiralling downwards and this will push up inflation. Accurate economic data is hard to come by from Uzbekistan but there is no arguing with the higher bus prices. This is the accurate inflation measure that is needed to gauge price rises in Uzbekistan.

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(Editorial from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)

Uzbekistan jails spy

APRIL 3 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – An Uzbek citizen received a 16-year jail sentence in Uzbekistan for spying for Tajikistan. The televised trial showed the man, Sharifjon Asrorov, confessing the alleged crimes. Tensions between Uzbekistan and Tajikistan continue to be high. Governments in Central Asia use espionage crimes to discredit rival neighbours.

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(News report from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)

Russian company launches Bukhara power station

APRIL 4 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – Eriell, a Russian oil service company, and Enesol, a UAE-based renewable energy company, said they have launched a 1.2MW mobile solar station, the first of its kind in the Commonwealth of Independent States to power Lukoil’s upstream operations in Kandym, near the border with Turkmenistan. Eriell is one of Lukoil’s largest suppliers in Uzbekistan.

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(News report from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)

Kyrgyzstan expropriates resorts

APRIL 4 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The Kyrgyz government signed a decree to retake possession of four Uzbek-owned resorts near Lake Issyk-Kul. Buston, Rokhat, Dilorom, and Golden Sands are all owned by Uzbek entities, both public and private. These are Soviet- era vacation resorts that had been built in the 1960s. Tensions have been running high between Kyrgyz and Uzbeks in Kyrgyzstan since ethnic fighting in Osh in 2010.

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(News report from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)

Bus prices rise in Uzbekistan

APRIL 2 2016 (The Conway Bulletin) – The cost of public transport in Uzbekistan, which is run by the state, rose 20% on April 1, various opposition websites reported. The price increase is more evidence of inflationary pressure building in the Uzbek economy. Utility prices have also risen recently and information leaking out of Uzbekistan has suggested that the value of the Uzbek sum currency on the Black Market has fallen.

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(News report from Issue No. 275, published on April 8 2016)