Page 3 - bne_October 2021_20211004

bne October 2021 Contents I 3
47 56 60
SPECIAL FOCUS
42 How a V-shaped market and ageing pipes and fields sent gas prices soaring
47 Nord Stream 2 completed as last pipe section welded into place
CENTRAL EUROPE
48 Benjamin Roll, Czech protest leader
51 Hungarian opposition accuses Fidesz of sabotaging first round of primary election
52 Poland declares state of emergency along border with Belarus to stem migration
53 Hungary and Russia reach long-term gas supply agreement
SOUTHEAST EUROPE
54 Romania’s anti-corruption struggle still inspiring its neighbours
56 World Bank drops Doing Business report after alleged pressure from Bulgaria-born IMF chief to favour China
57 Bulgaria’s Harvard-educated saviours-in-waiting
58 Merkel says EU should “keep its word” in relations with accession candidates
EASTERN EUROPE
60 European Medical Centre, 32 years of caring for Muscovites
64 Novatek deputy chairman arrested over allegedly hiding $93mn from IRS
65 Belarusian opposition leaders Maria Kolesnikova and Maksim Znak were sentenced to over a decade in jail
66 Assassination attempt made against Ukrainian president’s top adviser
72
OPINION
Hungary's surprise debt issuance demonstrates the EU's financial whip is not working
No debt ratio is safe for small EU countries
Turkey’s official inflation – nothing if not a head- scratcher
NEW EUROPE IN NUMBERS
Russia’s Duma elections statistics: the comet effect and the Moscow blob
68
74 law 75
67 Ukraine passes anti-oligarch
EURASIA
68 Iran cements ties with East as it becomes full member of SCO
69 SCO leaders tell West to bite bullet and hand billions to Taliban
71 Tens of millions of wealth fund dollars have ‘flowed to corporation linked to rela-tive of Uzbekistan’s Mirziyoyev’
79