Politics
Power and governance
Astana breaks its silence on the Uzbek scholar, and says Tashkent has been told
Kazakhstan's National Security Committee gave its first public word on the case of Ikboljon Qoraboyev on Thursday, in reply to a Tengrinews request: the pre-trial file is closed to disclosure under article 201 of the criminal procedure code, and “the Uzbek side has been officially notified through diplomatic channels”. Two months into the detention, it is the first confirmation from either government that the case exists.
Tokayev completes his cabinet on day 4 of 10, and changes 3 of its 24 names
Kassym-Jomart Tokayev signed the decrees that fill Kazakhstan's government on Thursday, 4 days into the 10 that the law on government gives a new prime minister. Of the 24 posts under Olzhas Bektenov, 21 keep the people who held them before the August election; the foreign, culture and emergencies ministries change hands.
The summit nobody counted the same way
A peak that lost a name to gain one, guests numbered 17, 18 or 21, documents 28 or 29, and a chamber that approved a government without saying by how many votes. In the region's week of ceremonies, numbers appeared where they flattered and vanished where they would bind.
Khachatryan gets 2 months in the jail that already holds Kocharyan
A Yerevan court ordered Gagik Khachatryan, the former finance minister and tax chief, held for 2 months, Sputnik Armenia and Kommersant reported on Wednesday morning. He goes to the Yerevan-Kentron detention centre, where Robert Kocharyan has been since last week, and the Human Rights Defender has opened an inquiry over a video of him that circulated online.
Kazakhstan brings Tleuberdi back from Vienna to run its foreign ministry
Mukhtar Tleuberdi, foreign minister from 2019 to 2023 and ambassador in Vienna since then, was appointed foreign minister again by decree on Wednesday. His is the first ministerial name of the government whose prime minister the Kurultai approved on Monday, on day 3 of the 10 days the law allows.
Tbilisi asks a court to send its pardoned Russian back to Russia
The Migration Department filed a petition with Tbilisi City Court on Tuesday to expel Denis Kulanin to Russia, 2 days after the same court allowed him to leave for a third country. He is still in the migration centre with a ticket to Yerevan he cannot use.
Armenia's former tax chief is carried into court on a stretcher
Gagik Khachatryan, who ran the State Revenue Committee and then the finance ministry under Serzh Sargsyan, was taken from his home by Investigative Committee officers on Tuesday and delivered to court lying down. The detention is the milestone the new case opened on 29 August had been pointing to.
Pashinyan drops the referendum, and Putin offers to leave Gyumri
Four days after Lavrov told Armenia to choose between the EU and the EAEU by referendum, Pashinyan told Putin in Bishkek there will be no referendum and no membership decision yet. Putin answered at his press conference in Bishkek that the Gyumri base stays only if Armenians want it, and invited Pashinyan to Moscow to go through the file point by point. The ultimatum has become a negotiation with a venue.
A pardoned Russian's ticket out of Georgia expires in a migration cell
Denis Kulanin, released from a protest-case sentence by presidential pardon on 28 August, spent 1 September in Tbilisi's temporary migrant detention center while a ticket to Yerevan bought for him went unused. The migration service wants a court-ordered deportation, and voluntary exit is blocked until a judge rules.
Dushanbe and Yerevan agree to convene their economic commission
Rahmon and Pashinyan used the SCO sidelines in Bishkek to line up the next session of the Tajik-Armenian intergovernmental commission on trade and economic cooperation, with business forums to follow. No documents were signed.
Armenia opens a new case against the man who ran its taxes and treasury
The Investigative Committee announced a new criminal case against Gagik Khachatryan, a former finance minister and former head of the State Revenue Committee, and said he would be detained. Prosecutors want 210 properties, stakes in 29 companies and 33 billion drams, about $85 million, forfeited.
The SCO leaves Bishkek with 28 documents and two new centers
The 25th anniversary summit closed on 1 September with 28 signed texts, the Bishkek Declaration at the top: charter amendments that add two new bodies to the organization's structure, a roadmap for settling more trade in national currencies, and sectoral programs running to 2030.
Charter amendments top the SCO's anniversary pile in Bishkek
The organisation's heads of state met in Bishkek today over a Bishkek Declaration and more than 20 documents, charter amendments among them. The final texts were still unpublished as this edition went to print.
Aliyev and Pashinyan pace out the Trump route in Bishkek
Azerbaijan's president and Armenia's prime minister met on the margins of the SCO summit on 31 August and discussed what both readouts call further practical steps on the TRIPP corridor. For one afternoon the normalisation track between Baku and Yerevan ran through Kyrgyzstan.
Kazakhstan fills both posts in a morning, and the ten-day clock starts
The Kurultai approved Yerlan Karin as vice-president and Olzhas Bektenov as prime minister on 31 August, and Tokayev signed both appointment decrees within hours. The resignation Bektenov handed in on Friday lasted 3 days. The message is continuity; the new fact is the seat built beside the presidency.
Tokayev gives the Security Council its own apparatus
While the chamber waits for a prime minister's name, the president spent Saturday building a state body: the Security Council's apparatus, directly subordinate and accountable to him.
Moscow packs a referendum for Bishkek
The Kremlin has named the topic Vladimir Putin brings to Nikol Pashinyan in Bishkek: the choice it wants Armenia to put to a vote.
The summit begins at dinner, and the declaration can wait
Xi Jinping opened his state visit with a Sunday-night dinner, Narendra Modi landed with his Tashkent deals already signed, and Moscow published its agenda before reaching the hall. The heads of state sit on Tuesday; the week they are meant to crown is already running.
Georgia's president pardons 9 from the protest cells
Mikheil Kavelashvili pardoned 9 people jailed across three waves of Georgian protest, from the 2024 marches against the foreign-agents law to last October's unrest, in an act the ruling party framed as answered petitions.
Lavrov answers the Kocharyan file with a referendum demand
Moscow's first comment above spokesperson level on Armenia's prosecuted ex-presidents arrived on Friday from Sergey Lavrov: the leadership in Yerevan is "guided by other tasks", the Eurasian membership on the table is worth $6 billion to $12 billion a year by his count, and the choice between Brussels and that union should go to a referendum without delay.