Page 6 - BNE_magazine_06_2019

6 I The Month That Was bne June 2019
Politics
Eastern Europe
Most Russians (85%) are happy with their job, according to the state owned pollster, the Russian Public Opinion Research Centre (VTsIOM), TASS reported on May 13. Two thirds of those polled (68%) also think that their salary "will not grow, most probably" if they work longer and more productively.
The deteriorating investment climate which followed Russia’s 2014 annex- ation of Ukraine’s Crimea is causing loss- es of at least $30bn every year, economist Sergei Guriev said in an interview.
The inauguration of Ukrainian Presi- dent-elect Volodymyr Zelenskiy took place on May 20, according to a special draft resolution greenlighted by the nation's parliament on May 16, which
in theory allows the new president to dissolve parliament before this October’s general election.
Two US senators plan to introduce
a bill targeting the Nord Stream 2 pipeline to Germany of Russian gas major Gazprom, Bloomberg reported on May 14 citing sources familiar with the plans. Now more troubles could be in sight for the project from the US, as Texas Republican Ted Cruz and New Hamp- shire Democrat Jeanne Shaheen, both members of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee, reportedly drafted a bill that would target vessels that lay the pipeline and would deny visas to executives from companies linked to those vessels.
Russia's government has issued a decree, which simplifies arms re-sales and re-exports to third countries, lifting the previously mandatory procedure of federal certification for all resellers down the sales chain, Vedomosti daily reported on May 15 citing the decree as of May 10.
Central Europe
Two centre-right economists will battle it out to become Lithuania’s
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next president in a run-off vote, results of the presidential election showed early on May 13. The incumbent Prime Minister Saulius Skvernelis dropped out of the race.
Hungary aims to strengthen its strategic alliance with the US, Prime Minister Viktor Orban said at a meeting with US President Donald Trump at the White House. The visit marks the end of a 2.5-year diplomatic mission to arrange the meeting, which comes days before the European Parliament election.
Southeast Europe
The ruling coalition's candidate Stevo Pendarovski was sworn in as the new president of North Macedonia after he won the second round of the presiden- tial election, defeating the main oppo- sition candidate. Pendarovski said
after the swearing-in ceremony in the parliament that he will serve all citizens regardless of their political and ethnic background and will aim to unite the deeply divided society.
Moldova’s President Igor Dodon
said he will dissolve the parliament unless lawmakers elect a speaker. The country’s new parliament has been sum- moned only once since the general elec- tion on February 24. The parliament is largely split between three main forces, none of which have so far managed to find common ground.
Thousands of Albanian opposition supporters staged another protest against the Socialist government of Prime Minister Edi Rama, demanding a snap election. For the second time in three days the protest erupted into violence, with protesters throwing smoke bombs and Molotov cocktails at the police.
Bosnia, Montenegro and Serbia signed a protocol determining the border point between the three coun- tries, moving a step further towards
a final border demarcation agreement. The three countries were part of former Yugoslavia and still have not defined all border demarcations clearly.
Eurasia
As China continued to stifle its coal imports from Australia across the first quarter, Mongolia and Russia benefited from the developments in March, when they made up 15% and 13% of China’s share of coal imports, respectively. This was in line with earlier reported figures which revealed that Mongolia’s coal exports rose 15% y/y
to 7.8mn tonnes in the first quarter.
Several anti-government protesters were arrested in Kazakhstan’s largest city Almaty and the capital Nur-Sultan while websites and social media apps went dark on May 9 during the celebra- tion of the 74th anniversary of the Allied victory against Nazi Germany in WWII. Many protesters are concerned at the lack of genuine opposition candidates
in the upcoming June snap presiden- tial election.
A senior Iranian lawmaker said that the security of Gulf states is fragile, referencing explosions near Fujairah port in the United Arab Emirates. “The explosions of Fujairah showed that the security of the south of the Persian Gulf is like glass,” Heshmatollah Falahat- pisheh, head of the Iranian parliament’s national security committee, wrote on his Twitter account.