Country News DigestIssue #6

10/09/12-10/12/12

Country News DigestPresident Aliev criticized BP’s performance in oil extraction in Azerbaijan

Azerbaijan

Georgia

Russiathis week, threatening to expel the company if necessary. BP is the current leader and majority shareholder of the consortium formed by the “contract of the century” ten years ago, but the Azerbaijani government has accused it of failing to fulfill its side of the bargain.

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On Wednesday, the Kremlin announced that it does not intend to renew the Nunn-Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction Program with the U.S., an agreement credited with removing and dismantling thousands of nuclear weapons in the former Soviet Union. Russia says it now has the finances required to maintain its own stockpiles without American aid.

Armenia

Moldova

Belarus

Ukraine

Turkey

Tymoshenko is again refusing to appear at her tax evasion trial, and the head of the OSCE election observation mission was denied a meeting with her. The OSCE will have over 600 observers monitoring the upcoming elections.

The International Atomic Energy Agency released the Integrated Nuclear Infrastructure Review on Belarus, a document that both gave Belarus high marks on reforms it has made in its nuclear power program and made suggestions on how to improve them further. Belarus plans to utilize financial support from Russia to build two new nuclear reactors by the year 2020.

The US and Moldova signed three bilateral agreements this week, providing an additional $11.5 million in assistence for the development of the Moldovan economy and public services, and to strengthen judicial institutions and the rule of law. The signing ceremony took place at a phyto-sanitary laboratory that was fully renovated with US assistance, helping Moldova meet international food safety standards.

President Mikheil Saa-kashvili accepted his government’s resignation

this week after his United National Movement lost to opposition leader Bidzina Ivanishvili’s Georgia Dream Coalition in the Oct. 1 parliamentary elections. The current cabinet will maintain its duties until the new cabinet, already nominated by Ivanishvili, is formed.

Former foreign minister Vartan Oskanian was formally charged on

Monday by Armenia’s National Security Service with one count of money laundering and one count of misappropriation of funds. If convicted Oskanian may face fines and up to 12 years in prison. The US Ambassador to Armenia, John Heffern, released a statement saying this development was “bad for justice and democracy in Armenia”.

NATO secretary general Anders Fogh Rasmussen announced that NATO has

“all necessary plans in place to protect and defend Turkey if necessary.” Turkey’s Chief of General Staff, Gen. Necdet Özel, has also signaled Turkey’s willingness to respond more harshly if mortars continue to fall on Turkey from Syria. On Wednesday Turkey forced a Syrian passenger plane in route from Moscow to Damascus to land in Ankara on suspicions of transporting military equipment.

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Country News DigestKyrgyzstan and Russia signed an agreement on readmission this week. The

Kyrgyzstan

Kazakhstan

agreement places mutual obligations on the two former Soviet states to prevent illegal migration. As part of the agreement Russia has agreed to pay all transportation costs of deportation.

The International Crisis Group released a report Monday arguing that Afghanistan is not ready to take over security operations after the 2014 withdrawal of US and NATO forces. The ICG also asserts it is a “near certainty” the 2014 elections will be plagued with fraud, likely resulting in high levels of violence across the country.

Mongolia

IranIn his first public response to the plunge of the Iranian rial and the resulting protests last week, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei warned government officials to curb the infighting over economic troubles and accused the West of blowing the protests out of proportion. The rial has lost 40% of its value this month and is down 80% against the dollar this year.

Turkmenistan’s cotton harvest is underway. More than 60% of the 1.1 million-ton harvest has already been collected. Turkmenistan plans to host an international cotton fair in late November which would promote Turkmen cotton and encourage foreign investment in the industry.

Ulan-Bator is set to remove a once prominent, but now decaying bronze statue of Lenin. Many other statues of Lenin were built and then torn down for scrap metal, but the statue in the capitol lasted so long because older Mongols still revere Lenin.

Vladimir Kozlov, leader of the Alga opposition party, was sentenced to 7½ years

in jail for seeking to overthrow the government. The case relates to the Zhanaozen uprising last December. Mr. Kozlov, an outspoken critic of President Nazarbayev, claims that the trial was meant to stifle the opposition.

Russia has agreed to exempt from duties and taxes one million tons of petroleum

products shipped to Tajikistan per year. Russia’s portion of the Tajik market has fallen from 95% two years ago to 62% today. The Tajik government predicts that the duty exemption could result in diesel and gasoline price reductions of up to 40%.

The U.S. and Uzbekistan have agreed to cooperate in efforts to disrupt drug

trade in the Central Asian state. The U.S. DEA will work with the Uzbek Interior Ministry. The drug trade through Uzbekistan originates in Afghanistan and either goes directly over the border or through Tajikistan. Drug seizures in the country rose last year to 5,404 kg ofdrugs, up from 4,716 kg the year before.

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Tajikistan

Uzbekistan

Afghanistan

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Turkmenistan

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Country News DigestBoth Russian and Estonian governments are working on a border treaty. The 2005

Estonia

Lithuania

Czech Republictreaty was rejected by the Russians due to the preamble, which made reference to pre-war Tartu territory. European Commission’s papers about visa freedom say Russia should be encouraged to ratify the treaty to help secure visa-freedom.

Numerous members of the Czech Roma community held a “Roma Pride March” this week in Prague. The Roma community often end up living in impoverished neighborhoods and risk government displacement, yet still depend heavily on government welfare to make ends meet, according to reports.

Latvia

Romania

Hungary

Poland

Tensions between Slovak and Roma populations in Slovakia have heightened this week. A large anti-Roma march whose participants included some neo-nazis took place in a region of Slovakia. Tensions were further strained when a local government official demolished an abandoned building that was previously inhabited by Roma.

Hungary’s inflation rate rose to 6.6% in September, marking a four-year high for the country. Prices have risen more than 5% in the past year, particularly on items such as food, fuel, and tobacco. Nonetheless, analysts remain optimistic that the inflation trend can be curbed by the end of the year.

Bulgaria and Romania signed an agreement this week to establish a joint committee to boost cooperation on projects along their shared border on the Danube River. The committee will try and stimulate cross-border transportation and improve local transportation infrastructure.

Lithuanians are likely to oust their government’s center-right coalition in

the upcoming October 14th elections. The Homeland-Union Lithuanian Christian Democrats placed fourth in the recent polls. The move away from the center-right is due to the prolonged austerity measures.

Latvia’s parliament has voted to extend the mandate for the

National Armed Forces’ participation in the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force (ISAF) in Afghanistan until October 13, 2013. Saeima’s decision was based on the United Nations Security Council’s decision to extend the mandate to 2013. Latvia has participated in the ISAF mission in Afghanistan since 2003.

An opinion poll conducted in Poland this week revealed that the conservative

leaning Law and Justice party led by controversial politician Jaroslaw Kacynski has unexpectedly overtaken the ruling party in popular support. This upswing in support follows a protest engineered by the Law and Justice party against the ruling party.

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Country News DigestPresident Rosen Plevneliev has nominated outgoing Chief Prosecutor Boris

Bulgaria

Albania

CroatiaVelchev to a seat on the Constitutional Court. The Bulgarian Constitutional Court is comprised of 12 members, 1/3 elected every three years. The Parliament elects two members while the President and a group of judges appoint one each.

Croatia only has ten tasks left to fill before its July 1, 2013 accession date. Croatia runs the same risks that Bulgaria and Romania had - not being prepared enough to join the EU.

Serbia

Macedonia

A journalist from a prominent Montenegrin newspaper was attacked by a politician from the ruling party, after the Prime Minister delivered a speech that accused the news outlet of supporting the opposition. Members of prominent non-governmental organizations have criticized the incident. According to reports, attacks on journalists are not uncommon in Montenegro.

Kosovo and Serbia formed a committee in order to discuss the implementation of a previously agreed-to plan that provides for joint operation of border crossing points between the two countries. Although tensions between the countries have been strained lately, both countries realize that they must improve their relationship in order to be considered for integration into the EU.

On Thursday the Slovenian government introduced legislation that extends the tax on bank assets and introduces a tax on financial services. It is believed this will enable the government to rake in an additional EUR 35 million in revenue. The new tax will be levied on commission on loans, loan brokering and management, loan guarantees, deposits, payments and other transactions, including securities trading and investment fund management.

A second Albanian dissident set himself on

fire in protest of not receiving compensation from the government. The compensation is with regard to a law passed in 2007, in which Albania promised former political prisoners $19 for every day they were in jail. The two are among 20 communist-era dissidents who began hunger strikes over two weeks ago.

The EU stated that it was not ready to hold accession talks with Serbia because

of its tensions with Kosovo. Belgrade has to do more to reform its judicial system, and is being urged to hold talks on normalizing ties with Kosovo.

The government of Prime Minister Nikola Gruevski and his VMRO DPMNE

party have survived a vote of no-confidence. The vote of no confidence followed several weeks of ethnic tension, that began when the ruling party proposed a bill that provided special privileges for veterans of the 2001 conflict in Macedonia, but excluded former Albanian insurgents.

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Montenegro

Kosovo

Slovenia

Balkan Insight

Country News Digest

Bosnia & Herzegovina

The Bosnian government on Tuesday signed two memorandums of understanding with Pakistan on improving trade relations between the two states. Bilateral trade between the two countries from July 2011 to April 2012 amounted to $447 million, far below the level both countries believe possible.

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Email: ceres@georgetown.edu Tel.: (202) 687-6080 Fax: (202) 687-5829

The Center for Eurasian, Russian and East European Studies is a U.S. Department of Education Title VI-funded National Resource Center (NRC)

that strives to increase understanding and appreciation of the cultures and challenges of the region stretching from Central Europe to the Pacific and

from the Baltic to the Mediterranean, Black and Caspian Seas

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