Caucasus
Coverage across the South Caucasus — Georgia, Armenia, and Azerbaijan.
Garibashvili’s bribery case goes to trial in open court after a hearing he did not attend
Judge Lela Kalichenko sent the former prime minister’s case to a hearing on the merits on Monday after the defence asked for its termination and the prosecution objected. The charge is a bribe of 1.5 million lari taken as part of a group, with 750,000 lari said to have passed through his former defence minister’s hands.
Kyrgyzstan takes the TurkPA chair from Kazakhstan with a mallet and a list of priorities
Aibek Dadebai, chairman of Kazakhstan’s Kurultai, handed the symbolic mallet of the Parliamentary Assembly of Turkic States to Jogorku Kenesh speaker Marlen Mamataliev in Bishkek on Tuesday. The assembly’s 15th plenary session runs there on 19 and 20 October with the speakers of Azerbaijan and Turkey in the hall.
Azeri Light falls to $116.26 on Report’s Saturday print after $119.04 on Friday
Report’s Saturday print put Azeri Light at $116.26 a barrel, down $2.78 or 2.33% on Friday’s print of $119.04, which was itself $5.10 or 4.11% below Thursday’s $124.14. No Monday print had appeared on the agency’s energy page by 11:24 Baku time.
Japarov leaves Yerevan with a roadmap to 2029, a travel agreement and a pension accord
Sadyr Japarov’s official visit to Armenia on 16 and 17 October ended with a joint statement with Nikol Pashinyan and a set of documents exchanged in Yerevan: a cooperation roadmap for 2027 to 2029, an agreement on procedures for citizens’ visits and stays, a memorandum on protecting Lakes Sevan and Issyk-Kul, a sister-city agreement between Yerevan and Bishkek and an agreement on cooperation in pension provision, Armenpress reported on Saturday.
Azeri Light falls 2.91% to $124.14 a barrel on Report’s Thursday print
Azerbaijan’s export blend fell $3.73, or 2.91%, to $124.14 a barrel on the world market, Report wrote at 09:58 Baku time on 15 October, after the $127.87 print of Wednesday. December Brent futures stood at $127.55 a barrel on the same page.
Georgia’s party-ban hearings open in Batumi on 21 October as the opposition plans protests
The Constitutional Court’s proceedings on the petition to ban opposition parties begin on 21 October, Coalition for Change leader Nika Gvaramia said on 15 October, naming Batumi as the venue and promising to attend, Interpressnews reported. The opposition alliance announced a protest campaign from 25 October to a rally on 28 November, and Georgian Dream’s majority meets Bidzina Ivanishvili on 17 October.
Yerevan declares ENA an overriding public interest and sets up a railway group with Russia
Armenia’s government recognised 100% of the shares of Electric Networks of Armenia, or ENA, owned by the Tashir group, as an overriding public interest at its sitting on 15 October, the status Armenian law requires before the state can take property, News.am reported. Tashir’s owner Samvel Karapetyan leads the opposition Strong Armenia alliance. Nikol Pashinyan the same day set up a working group with Russia on the railway concession.
Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan switch on a 380 km Caspian cable and sign a Middle Corridor pact
Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and Ilham Aliyev opened the Trans-Caspian fibre-optic line between Sumgayit and Aktau online on 15 October, a 380 km cable on the seabed with a capacity above 400 terabits a second, Report said. In their presence the two governments exchanged a signed agreement on the Middle Corridor and restated a $1 billion trade target, Akorda said.
Baku keeps the CICA chair to 2028 and an Azerbaijani takes the secretary general’s post
The seventh CICA summit in Baku on 15 October extended Azerbaijan’s chairmanship to 2028, made Azerbaijani ambassador Sultan Hajiyev secretary general to 2030 and admitted Laos as the 29th member, Azerbaijan’s foreign ministry said. Kazakhstan founded the forum in 1992 and a Kazakh ran its secretariat until this week. Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said the members had agreed to turn CICA into a full international organisation, a line the ministry omits.
Azeri Light slips 2.85% to $127.87 a barrel, $63 above the budget’s $65
Azerbaijan’s export blend fell $3.75, or 2.85%, to $127.87 a barrel on the world market, Report wrote on 14 October citing an oil-market source, with the FOB Ceyhan price down $4.19 to $116.51. The blend stays about $63 above the $65 a barrel on which the 2026 state budget is calculated.
Pashinyan sets terms for peace: no enclaves on either side, all roads open, no claims
Armenia’s prime minister set out on 14 October what the country should look like after the peace agreement with Azerbaijan is signed and ratified: the same 29,743 square kilometres the state counts today, borders drawn from the Alma-Ata Declaration, enclaves exchanged for land of equal size and all roads open, within TRIPP and beyond it.
Four Central Asian presidents are in Baku for the seventh CICA summit
Tokayev, Mirziyoyev, Rahmon and Japarov are in Baku for the seventh summit of the Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia on 15 October, their third joint appearance in eight days. Azerbaijan closes two years in the chair with a Baku declaration expected, Laos is to be admitted as the 29th member, and the forum’s depositary and secretary general are Kazakh.
Armenia counts 45,098 new citizens among the people displaced from Karabakh in 2023
Deputy interior minister Armen Ghazaryan told a working discussion in the National Assembly on 13 October that 53,099 applications for Armenian citizenship have come from people forcibly displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh, adults and minors, and that 45,098 have received it. Uptake rose, he said, once citizenship became a condition of the state housing assistance programme.
ADB lends Baku $302 million for metro signalling inside a $2.6 billion expansion
The Asian Development Bank approved a $302.38 million loan on 13 October to replace Baku Metro’s signalling with communications-based train control and to digitalise its operations. The project costs $515.07 million, with the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank adding $79.98 million and the government $132.71 million, and sits inside a state programme the bank puts at $2.6 billion.
Venice Commission finds Georgia’s grants and party laws block an opposition from surviving
Europe’s constitutional-law body, the Venice Commission, has published its opinion on the amendments Georgia’s parliament adopted in March to the Law on Grants, the organic law on political associations and the criminal code, Interpressnews reported on 13 October. The legislation imposes disproportionate and unnecessary restrictions on freedom of association and expression, the commission found, “preventing the formation and survival of a political opposition”.
The IMF slows seven of nine regional economies in 2026 and lifts Uzbekistan and Azerbaijan
The IMF’s October World Economic Outlook, published on Tuesday, has growth slowing this year in seven of the nine economies CAW covers, with Kyrgyzstan still the fastest at 9% and Azerbaijan the slowest at 1.7%. Uzbekistan edges up to 7.8% and Azerbaijan gains too, from 1.4%. World growth slows to 3.1% in 2026 and recovers to 3.4% in 2027, the Fund says.
Kallas calls the EU’s Georgia policy short on both counts and returns to it in January
The EU’s current approach to Georgia neither creates sufficient pressure for change nor lets the bloc fully pursue its European strategic interests, Kaja Kallas said after the foreign ministers’ council in Luxembourg on Monday, and the ministers will return to it in January. In the Council’s own summary that reads as grave concern and an in-depth discussion expected in January. The governing party answered before she spoke and after.
Amulsar opens with the state at 12.5% and three towns promised $7 to 9 million a year
Nikol Pashinyan launched operations at the Amulsar gold mine on Saturday, saying the minerals “that turned into gold before our eyes today belong to the Republic of Armenia”, Armenpress reported. Lydian Armenia operates it with the state at 12.5%. Gnel Sanosyan, the government’s representative on the operator’s board, said Jermuk, Vayk and Sisian would receive $7 to 9 million a year and Jermuk National Park $5 million.
Russia’s watchdog halts wine, cognac, beer and Nabeglavi water from six Georgian producers
Russia’s consumer watchdog ordered a halt to the import and sale of drinks from six Georgian producers, Rossiyskaya Gazeta reported on Saturday, citing an order obtained by RBC. On the list are wines from Tbilvino, Teliani Valley, Wineman and Askaneli Brothers, whose cognac is also named, beer from the Georgian Beer Company, Nabeglavi mineral water and one Coca-Cola soft drink. The order calls itself a temporary sanitary measure.
Armenia’s Constitutional Court rejects the opposition’s challenge on the Catholicos clause
The Constitutional Court refused on Friday to examine a petition by the Strong Armenia and Armenia factions against the National Assembly’s decision approving the government programme, which envisages the removal of Catholicos Karekin II, ruling that programme provisions are political statements without normative content. Speaker Ruben Rubinyan also signed the order composing a parliamentary inquiry committee on the clergy that only majority deputies joined.