Category: Eastern Europe

Belarusian Gold, Forex Reserves at Record High

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date January 18, 2012
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After Belarus’ reserves were depleted last year owing to a severe financial crisis, it has achieved the set 2012 target of US$7 billion in forex and gold reserves in the very first week, the National Bank of Belarus said in a statement earlier this month.

As local information agency BelTA reports, the increase in the gold and foreign exchange reserves was facilitated by the second tranche of the EurAsEC Anticrisis Fund loan to the tune of US$440 million and the transfer of part of the syndicated loan provided to OAO Belaruskali by Sberbank of Russia and the Eurasian Development Bank.

Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade Finance & Taxes Issue Legal & Regulatory Politics

Ukraine to Confirm Pension Reform for IMF Tranche

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date July 11, 2011
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Ukraine’s Verkhovna Rada has approved an unpopular pension reform bill set as a key requirement to unlock a US$15.6 billion aid package from the International Monetary Fund to the Ukrainian economy.

The bill, approved early Friday, is designed to overhaul Ukraine’s Soviet-era pension system as the government seeks to slash spending in the wake of the Global Financial Crisis.

Ukraine’s parliament approved a government bill on pension reform at first reading on June 16.

Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade Russia

Georgia Wants to Double FDI to US$1 Billion

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date May 10, 2011
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Georgia expects foreign investment to double to US$1 billion this year, with energy and tourism sectors leading the way, its economy minister Vera Kobalia said last Wednesday.

Foreign direct investment in Georgia fell 16 percent in 2010 year on year to US$553 million, official data shows, well below the US$1 billion target already set for last year. Nevertheless, FDI still accounted for 5 percent of gross domestic product in 2010.

Central Asia Culture & History Eastern Europe Russia Science & Technology

Armenia’s Metsamor One of the Most Dangerous Nuclear Power Plants

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date April 18, 2011
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Experts have called Armenia’s Metsamor nuclear power plant “among the most dangerous” nuclear plants still in operation.

The Metsamor nuclear power plant is only 20 miles from Armenia’s capital and most populous Yerevan city. Its location in a seismic zone has drawn renewed attention since Japan’s nuclear crisis, NatGeo magazine said in its article “Is Armenia’s Nuclear Plant the World’s Most Dangerous?”

The power plant Metsamor was built in 1979 and closed in 1989 after an earthquake prompted officials to reconsider the safety of the location.

Culture & History Current Events Eastern Europe Issue Russia Vietnam

BBC to End its Radio Broadcasting in Post-Socialistic States

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date March 29, 2011
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BBC World Service, which is a U.K. Foreign and Commonwealth Office-funded Broadcasting Services Organization in 32 languages world wide, will close its broadcasting operations in Azeri, Turkish, Ukrainian, Vietnamese and Russian, as well as in five languages of Balkan Republics due to the drastic budget cuts by the British government from Saturday March 26.

The broadcasting operations are going to close in Serbian, Portuguese, Macedonian, Albanian, and English in Balkan republics Serbia, Macedonia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Kosovo.

Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade Issue Legal & Regulatory Russia

Latvia to Lure Foreign Investors With Five Year EU Residence

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date February 9, 2011
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A new Latvian law that provides residency rights to foreign investors has provided a boost to the real estate market and nationalist sentiment alike, the BBC reported.

The new amendment to the Latvian Law on Immigration came into force in July, 1, and allows foreign investors and their family members including those from non-EU countries to receive a 5-year residence permit in Latvia along with the right to travel in the Schengen area freely, if they purchase Latvian property of at least 70,000 euros (US$95,000) in value, or invest in a business.

Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade Issue Legal & Regulatory

Large-Scale Privatization Planned in Ukraine

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date January 13, 2011
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Ukraine hopes to gain from privatization of US$1.3 billion in 2011 by selling at least 25 percent in 162 enterprises this year, Interfax reports.

The draft list of enterprises includes stakes that have been offered multiple times in the past but never sold.

“We continue to campaign, that the electricity should go for privatization. And it will be privatized. This will be the main event of the privatization of the year,” Alexander Ryabchenko, Ukrainian State Property Fund (SPF) chairman said earlier in December 2010.

Central Asia Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade International Relations Issue Russia

Turkmenistan to Pledge Gas for the Nabucco Project

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date November 23, 2010
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Turkmenistan is ready to provide the European Union with some 40 billion cubic meters of natural gas annually for the Nabucco gas pipeline project.

“Given the domestic consumption in the west of the country and gas supplies from there to Iran, we will have 40 billion cubic meters of gas annually for export, so that European countries do not have to worry,” Turkmenistan’s Deputy PM Baymurad Khodzhamukhamedov said at the Oil and Gas Turkmenistan-2010 Forum in Ashgabat.

Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade

Ukraine to Reduce Russian Gas Dependence

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date November 3, 2010
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Ukraine wants to build its first liquefied natural gas terminal on the Black Sea by the end of 2016 as it seeks to reduce dependence on Russian gas imports.

The terminal will cost US$1.21 billion to US$1.38 billion and will reduce dependence on Russia by around one-third, Petro Miroshnikov from Ukraine’s National Project state body, the manager of the project, said in handout given to reporters in Kiev on Tuesday.

Eastern Europe Economy & Foreign Trade International Relations Politics Russia

Estonia to Reduce Russian Energy Dependence

Post author By The Proletariat
Post date October 26, 2010
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Estonia’s Parliament will accept a bill allowing the separation of AS Eesti Gaas’s natural gas sales and transmission divisions in two years to reduce dependence on Russia’s Gazprom.

A draft bill requiring Eesti Gaas AS, an Estonian natural gas company which imports and sells natural gas, to split the ownership of sales and networks by Jan. 1, 2013 is “90 percent ready,” said Igor Grazin, a lawmaker with Prime Minister Andrus Ansip’s Reform Party, in a interview with Bloomberg.