Page 6 - BNE_magazine_06_2020 Growers

6 I The Month That Was bne June 2020
Politics
Eastern Europe
The leader of Chechnya and one of the most controversial figures in Russian politics, Ramzan Kadyrov, has reportedly been admitted to “one of the best hospitals in Moscow” after he was believed to be infected with the coronavirus, it was reported on May 21.
Russian business portal and publisher RBC faces RUB43bn ($0.6bn) in compensation payments in a legal claim by Russian oil giant Rosneft
for the publication by RBC that Rosneft is linked to a temporary 0.4% dive
in its share price. As reported by bne IntelliNews, a joint investigation between The Bell, Medusa, Forbes and Vedomosti showed that Rosneft has taken control of another of Russia’s leading independent newspapers, Vedomosti.
The Russian government may delay imposing part of the investment obligations on telecoms companies under the so-called Yarovaya law for a year to ease the pressure during the pandemic. The associated investment is estimated to be worth $1bn.
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy may run for a second presidential term, despite campaigning last year on the promise of serving
one term. "I will think about it," news agency Interfax quoted him as saying. He said that one term is not enough to complete all the tasks he has set himself.
Maksym Nefyodov is challenging his dismissal from his post of head of the State Customs Service in April, seeking his subsequent reinstatement
www.bne.eu
in the Kyiv district administrative court. Nefyodov is seen as a reformer and was ousted by vested interests profiting from smuggling.
Ukraine’s uber-oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky is under investigation by a US Grand Jury for laundering over $600mn through US property deals in a five year long spending spree and other scams, BuzzFeed News reported. The money that Kolomoisky is accused of moving to the US was part of the $5.5bn he and his partner looted from the deposits of PrivatBank.
Harlem Desir, the OSCE representative on freedom of the media, has expressed his concerns and denounced the detention and imprisonment of Belarusian journalists, including freelancers, in May. Belarusian courts sentenced four reporters to 10 days
of administrative arrest on charges of participating in "unauthorised events", while reporting on demonstrations.
Central Europe
Poland’s presidential election should take place on June 28, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said on May 21. Poles were supposed to vote to keep the incumbent President Andrzej Duda in power for another five years or elect
a new head of the state on May 10.
But the voting by post option eventually led to unprecedented cancelling of
the election.
Eurasia
Turkey’s new light aircraft carrier,
the TCG Anadolu, is set to go operational this year in an ahead-of- schedule move that will transform the country’s naval power, Forbes wrote. The carrier boasts a large helicopter landing deck for up to 14 helicopters and un-crewed combat air vehicle capacity. It also has amphibious capabilities that will raise the ability of Turkey’s military to conduct overseas operations.
The government has also approved
the easing of all curfew restrictions in Budapest over the weekend in effect from May 18. Orban was granted dictatorial powers to deal with the coronavirus crisis.
Southeast Europe
Slovenia's Football Association (NZS) announced on May 19 that the premier league (Prva liga) matches will resume on June 5 after more than a two-month break due to the coronacrisis. At the time 25 rounds out of 36 in the season had been played.
The National Council for Combating Discrimination (CNCD) has fined Romanian president Klaus Iohannis just over €1,000 for “discrimatory” statements on Szeklerland autonomy and “breaching the right to dignity based on ethnic/national criteria”. The presidential administration said that the CNCD decision is a “deeply political one,” and announced that Iohannis would challenge it in court.
Poland’s largest opposition party, Civic Platform (PO), will reportedly change its presidential candidate in the face of poor polling results for the current candidate Malgorzata Kidawa- Blonska. She has plunged from over 20% in the polls to below 5% in recent polls.
Prime Minister Viktor Orban will
give up his extraordinary powers at the end of May, the PM said at
a joint press conference with Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic in Belgrade.