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February 21, 2011

The year 2011 has commenced with unprecedented levels of political turmoil, violence and tension in the Middle East. While this will not necessarily come as a surprise to readers of our previous research on the region, the fact that the Tunisian and Egyptian presidents have been dismissed from power barely within weeks of one another as a result of wide-scale street demonstrations in these two countries, clearly implies that the region has once again entered into a “game breaking” situation. As violence and further protests continue to spread rapidly across the region, the key question of concern to governments, investors and Middle Eastern ruling elites is now which regime is likely to fall next ? Despite the often overlooked heterogeneities of the region, the dramatic events already having taken place in Tunisia and Egypt in the first weeks of 2010 have inspired a domino effect of protests. Demonstrations of varying degree of magnitude are presently engulfing Bahrain, Yemen, Libya, Algeria, Morocco and Iran. They have also taken place in Jordan, while smaller scale demonstrations were planned in Kuwait. While other states across the Middle East are reporting less protest activity, the threat that the Egyptian-Tunisian contagion is posing to the region as a whole cannot not be underestimated. READ MORE

ISSUE #0
01/31/2011

Prosecutor General's Office (PGO) of the Czech Republic sees impossible the extradition of the former Minister of Economy of Ukraine Bohdan Danylyshyn. On January 21st, 2011, Czech authorities submitted a petition to the Prague City Court asking not to allow the extradition of B.Danylyshyn from the Czech Republic to Ukraine due to his getting a political asylum in the Czech Republic. READ MORE

January 2011

Key Points:
• The Nabucco pipeline received several pieces of good news in January, but there is little sign of any movement towards commencement of construction works. Further, Italy’s ENI has rejected any possible suggestions that Nabucco could merge with Russia’s South Stream.

• Turkish Prime Minister, Recep Erdogan, has responded to criticisms that new laws advocating the restrictions of alcohol reflect an infringement on personal freedoms of Turkish citizens.

• The widely discussed “conspiracy” of the Sledgehammer coup plot is once again in the lime light, as prosecutors allege plans by the plotters to bomb two Istanbul mosques.

• Following the release of 5 members of the banned (Turkish) Hizbullah organisation in January, a fiery security- political debate has erupted as to whether there is a link between the AKP government and the outlawed group.

• While Istanbul hosts talks between the P5 +1 and Iran over the latter’s nuclear ambitions, Turkey sits out the meeting. A settlement on Cyprus appears impossible after Turkey and the EU sit out January talks in Geneva, with some critics saying this is the end for Turkey’s own EU accession negotiations.

• A day after Saudi Arabia halted its efforts in support of the formation of a new government in Lebanon, the joint Turkish/Qatari mission followed suit, claiming that the disputing Lebanese factions indicated reservations with external proposals to help broker a deal. READ MORE

The Gorshenin Institute has asked experts about the key positive and negative aspects of the resolution on Ukraine adopted by the European Parliament. READ MORE

December 2010

Key positions:
• In recent months Turkey has witnessed harsh prison sentences and threats of litigation by Turkish authorities in response to Kurdish protests and unfavourable press respectively in the past months. This is a worrying sign in that after nearly a decade in power, AKP authorities have become just as reactionary as the military backed governments of previous decades, only this time with an Islamic tinge.

• At the NATO Lisbon Summit on November 19-20, Ankara claimed victory for swaying its allies away from designating Iran as the main threat facing the alliance with regards to a proposed missile defence system which NATO is currently considering. While Turkish government officials indicated prior to the conference that they would demand command and control of the system if based on their territory, in Lisbon, that decision was put off for future discussion.

• Wikileaks’ release of American diplomatic cables have detailed the gossip and personalities of leading AKP politicians, but offered little else that could be described as damaging.

• In regional energy developments, Russia and its energy subsidiary, Gazprom, have been opting for pragmatism over threats in recent months by signing deals throughout the region with Bulgaria, Serbia, and Ukraine in order to strengthen prospects of realising the South Stream gas pipeline. Brussels and Sofia, for their part, have reached an agreement on bank guarantees for Nabucco (the EU’s rival to South Stream). READ MORE

ISSUE #21
12/03/2010

On November 26th, 2010 in Moscow after the Ukrainian-Russian Intergovernmental Commission President of Ukraine announced that he did not rule out Ukraine entering the Customs Union (CU) with Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. He added that, in order to achieve that goal certain amendments to the Constitution of Ukraine should be made, which according to him could be done either in the Parliament or by a National referendum. Earlier, in April, Viktor Yanukovych has expressed an opposite opinion regarding this matter. 'Ukraine has made a choice in favor of joining the World Trade Organization (WTO). Ukraine is already integrated in the WTO and today Ukraine entering the Customs Union would be impossible', -he said. th As a reminder, on November 25 European Parliament adopted a resolution on Ukraine. In this document European legislators are calling on Ukraine to make all effort to finish negotiation on an agreement as to the Association Treaty between the European Union (EU) and Ukraine in the first half of 2011. READ MORE

ISSUE #19
11/19/2010

Head of the International Monetary Fund (IMF) mission in Ukraine Thanos Arvanitis said that Ukraine had fulfilled all main obligations within the framework of the cooperation program with the IMF. Prime-Minister of Ukraine Nikolay Azarov predicts that by the end of 2010 the Board of Directors of the IMF would decide on granting Ukraine the second tranche of the loan in the amount of 1.6 billion dollars. READ MORE