Giulia Tessadri - Senior Researcher Mondo Internazionale G.E.O. Politics Area
Nicola Zanini - Junior Researcher Mondo Internazionale G.E.O. Politics Area
Abstract
This paper provides an analysis of the tensions that took place in Kazakhstan at the beginning of 2022. Despite the stability of the country, the biggest and most important protests since its independence took place in the beginning of January. The tensions began due to the increase in the price of liquefied petroleum gas (LPG), yet there are many more grievances. Why did these protests take place? What are the main grievances? Which are the foreign interests in the area? How did the world react? In this framework, the aim of the paper is to provide a wider analysis on what has happened and why. Specifically, firstly there is an analysis of the historic background of the country. Secondly, foreign interests in the country are analyzed. Thirdly, an analysis of what has happened is provided. Fourthly, the impact of the reactions of other countries is investigated.
1. Brief Introduction to Kazakhstan
The Republic of Kazakhstan is the largest country in Central Asia, and the ninth largest globally. As a result of the fruitful use of its abundant reserves of oil - of which it produces 1,600,000 barrels everyday - natural gas, and minerals, it is also the biggest economy in the region (Britannica, 2022). Despite being so rich, most people in the country do not benefit from its wealth. The average monthly wage assessment shows that the average person in Kazakhstan earns close to 270.000 KZT (Kazakhstani Tenge) , equivalent to around 600 USD (Bureau of National statistics of Kazakhstan, 2021), creating large inequalities between the super rich and the poor. In fact, 162 people hold around fifty-five percent of the country’s wealth (KPMG, 2019).
The inequality in the country is one of the results of Kazakhstan’s history; throughout the centuries, Kazakhstan’s territory has been included into various empires, one of them being the Mongolian Empire. From the detachment from the territories of this empire, came their name. The Kazakhs were dissatisfied by their rulers so they decided to flee the territory of what is currently Uzbekistan and they came to be known as Kazakh, meaning “independent” or “vagabond”.
The extremely divided territory of Kazakhstan, from both a regional and cultural standpoint, was exploited by Tsarist Russia to annex it to its empire. By 1742 the population had accepted the Russian ruler, seeing it as a possible protector from the threat of other nations’ conquests. Taking only a spectator point of view in the 1917 Russian civil war, Kazakhstan was occupied in 1920 by the Red Army, whose political leaders installed a temporary Regime. This was transformed in 1925 into the Kazakh Autonomous Socialist Soviet Republic (ASSR), in which the Russian government pursued an ambitious plan to transform the population from a nomadic one into a sedentary one. In 1936 the Union of the Soviet Socialistic Republics (USSR) promoted Kazakhstan to a constituent Socialist Soviet Republic (SSR). In 1990, following the end of the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan declared its sovereignty, becoming fully independent on December 16th 1991. After an initial democratic stage, it increasingly became an authoritarian regime (Treccani, 2022).
Kazakhstan is currently a presidential republic, its constitution was written in 1995, four years after its independence in 1991, and subsequently amended several times, the last of which was in 2019. The President is head of state, commander in chief of the military, as well as head of the executive branch. The President is, in fact, responsible for appointing the Prime Minister and all of the government’s cabinet. Most of the latter must be approved by the legislative branch, apart from the foreign minister, the minister of defense, and the minister of internal affairs. The legislative branch is composed of two chambers: the Senate, of which almost a third is appointed by the President, and the Mazhilis (namely the lower chamber), composed in the vast majority by elected members. The judiciary power is instead held, in its utmost point, by the Supreme Court, alongside with the Constitutional Court, whose members are appointed by the President (Central Intelligence Agency, 2021).
Political power in Kazakhstan had been held for more than thirty years by Nursultan Nazarbayev. He was an official of the Kazakh SSR and was President of the independent Kazakhstan from 1991 to 2019, creating strong relations with Vladimir Putin. During this period of time, no real opposition was allowed to flourish. It was therefore possible for Nazarbayev to build, in his thirty years of power, a system that revolved around him and his family allowing him to also not address the democratic issue, thus not taking steps in the direction of a more democratic government.Nevertheless, in 2019, he formally stepped down as President and handpicked as his successor Qasym-Jomart Tokayev, who had already covered numerous high ranking positions in Kazakhstan as, for example, Premier and Chair of the Senate.
Even though he was no longer President, Nazerbayev still held many titles and roles in Kazakhstan. He was, in fact, still Elbasy (leader of the nation), Chief of the powerful Security Council of Kazakhstan and also leader of the party in power (the Nur Otan ,“Radiant Fatherland”). His family is, moreover, in high places of power in the country, including the banking institutions. For example, his daughter, Dariga Nazarbayeva, was elected as Chair of the Senate, after the confirmation of Tokayev as President. At the same time, being Tokayev Nazarbayev’s dauphin, the latter still maintained decisional power on the politics of the country, to the point that people in the country still viewed Nazarbayev as the de facto President and Tokayev as his puppet (Al Jazeera, 2022).
2. Foreign Interests In The Area
As said, Kazakhstan’s territory is extremely extensive, despite being inhabited by only 20 million people. Kazakhstan is considered an extremely important and strategic country at the international level. As previously mentioned, Kazakhstan is the richest country in Central Asia and the top energetic exporter in the framework of the CIS countries –the Commonwealth of Independent States– which is composed of nine out of the fifteen former Soviet republics.
The country is, indeed, very rich in natural resources, which help in strongly influencing its strength and importance at the international level. In particular, the country is extremely rich in hydrocarbons, such as methane, oil, coal, iron, uranium and other important resources. Moreover, on Kazakhstan’s territory there is the Baikonur Cosmodrome, a crucial spaceport for Russia and the European Space Agency. Kazakhstan also plays an important role in maintaining the political and economical stability of the region.
Around one fifth of the country’s inhabitants is ethnically Russian, and this plays an important role in the position adopted by the Kremlin towards Kazakhstan. Russia has a clear and strong interest in the country, sharing a border of almost 8,000 kilometers. The proximity is a crucial factor in shaping Russian foreign policy in the area. Moreover, Russia has invested deeply in the country, therefore it is in its interest to sustain the stability of the country and to avoid regime change. The crisis has, however, jeopardized the stability of the country. After the protests in favor of democracy that took place in Ukraine in 2014 and in Belarus in 2020, the Kazakhstan protests represent the third important revolts aimed at establishing democracy and at opposing authoritarianism, among the countries politically close to Russia, a change that could potentially threaten Russia's interests in the area (ISPI, 2022). In order to avoid a regime change, the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) - a Russian-led military alliance of five former Soviet states - has intervened to help stabilize the situation. It is possible, therefore, to say that Kazakhstan is extremely important for Russia for the above mentioned reasons, and Russia, likewise, is crucial for Kazakhstan (Rivista il Mulino, 2022).
Russia is not the only country which has deep interests in Kazakhstan. China also shares some 1,800 km of border with it, on its western side, thus instability in the country could potentially threaten its own, as well as its strengthening. Moreover, in Kazakhstan there are approximately 200.000 Uyghurs - the Muslim group persecuted by Chinese authorities, thus increasing Chinese interest in the area. In addition, the country is crucial for the Belt and Road Initiative (BRI), since it is a key transit point. The BRI is aimed at economical integration with Europe, through the historical Silk Road and for Beijing it is, therefore, a geopolitical opportunity to increase its influence abroad. China is, for these reasons, not interested in a change in power and wants to preserve the current situation. Regional instability has increased also in relation to Afghanistan and Myanmar, thus requiring for China a more secure framework and an interest in pursuing stability and reinforcing the relations with neighboring countries.
It is possible to notice many common points in the positions adopted by China and Russia. Firstly, both countries neighbor Kazakhstan and have strong economic interests in the country, also due to the enormous investments made in the region. For these reasons, both countries are willing to promote stability and to prevent a revolution.
Regarding the United States, its relations with Kazakhstan have been positive; for the US, the country is extremely important from a geopolitical point of view. Being located in Central Asia and being relatively stable, Kazakhstan holds a critical position. As said, it borders both Russia and China, and also holds an important location to promote counterterrorism operations in the region: for instance, in Afghanistan. The importance of counterterrorism for the US has thus deepened the relations they entertain with Kazakhstan. Moreover, the US have also invested in the country from an energetical standpoint, and some important American companies, such as Chevron and ExxonMobil, also have interests in the country due to its richness in oil and gas (US News, 2022).
In addition to these countries, Kazakhstan plays, more in general, an important role in Europe, due to its wealth of natural resources, especially gas and oil. Italy in particular is the first European commercial partner of the country and in the first nine months of last year 515,000,000€ of oil were imported. Moreover, for Italy, Kazakhstan is the ninth partner in terms of oil imported, after Azerbaijan, Libya, Iraq, Saudi Arabia, Russia, Nigeria and the United States (Altreconomia, 2022).
Moreover, it is worth mentioning the role played by Bitcoin; Kazakhstan is the second country in the extraction of this cryptocurrency; as of August 2021, 18% of the global mining - the process leading to the creation of Bitcoin - took place in the country (Sky TG24, 2022). The prices and the weather are extremely favorable, since technological equipment requires low temperatures. The increase in Bitcoin's mining led to a 10% increase in electricity consumption (Mondo Internazionale, 2022). The extremely high quantity of energy required for Bitcoins led to blackouts despite the country’s richness in energy and led to the consequent need to import it from Russia. Thus, Bitcoin has an important role in shaping the interests in the country.
3. What Has Happened
Protests broke out on January 2nd 2022 in the city of Zhanaozen, an important oil hub located in the south-west and in proximity of the Caspian Sea. The city had already been the location of violent clashes between the police and the protesters ten years ago (BBC News, 2022). Soon after, the protests spread throughout the country, leading to numerous deaths, injuries and arrests. As a response, in many cities curfews were adopted and mass gatherings prohibited.
The protests started due to the cancellation of the price cap for liquefied petroleum gas (LPG) decided by the governments and the consequent increase in the price of it.
Only 2 days later, the protests expanded in Almaty, the biggest city in the country. On January 4th a group related to the movement “Oyan, Qazaqstan” (i.e. Wake up, Kazakhstan) gathered in the city. Soon after, members of political movements, service sector workers, unemployed young people from the periphery, internal migrants, and some individuals of the urban middle class joined in the protests . It is believed that the majority of the protesters were men between the age of 20 and 40 (openDemocracy, 2022). Soon after, more and more citizens joined the protests, creating more diversity in them and in their motives: some individuals took to the streets due to the difficulties in paying the high prices for houses, other individuals were demanding a wage increase.
After the first day of protests, security apparatuses began to use force against protesters. Soon the situation became extremely chaotic and violent with armed clashes, explosions and shootings. The confusion and the lack of clarity within the situation is also linked to the shutdown of communications and internet in almost all of the country, thus little information was available and the narrative of the events was left to state media (OpenDemocracy, 2022) .
After the second day of protests President Tokayev released a statement calling the protesters “foreign trained terrorists, extremists and radicals” (Rivista il Mulino, 2022). This declaration has strong accusatory connotations. Following this, Tokayev requested support fromCSTO and on January 6th the troops entered the country in order to placate the protests. In addition to that, to calm the situation Nazarbayev was removed from his position as head of the security council.
As order was restored some aspects remain unclear. Firstly, the origins of the protests are unknown: no specific organization or party took the credit (Rivista il Mulino, 2022). Moreover, the link between the first protests and the episodes of violence remains unclear (OpenDemocracy, 2022). So, it is not transparent who was part of the armed groups and this adds up to the already present lack of information due to the communications shutdown.
Despite this, one aspect is clear: the protests go well beyond the rise of LPG price and have other grievances. As said, Kazakhstan is very rich in natural resources, but, still in the past 30 years only a small élite has used the profits deriving from oil and gas, with the majority of the population living in harsh conditions. It is possible to say, therefore, that the protests have a clear economic base. In this framework, the rise of LPG price is not affordable for the middle class and this adds up to the increasing inflation and the socio-economic gap. Moreover, the economic differences are reflected also on a geographic level: the Atyrau region is the richest in the country and its GDP (Gross Domestic Product) pro capita is three times national average, while in the Turkestan region, which is the poorest, the GDP pro capita is one third of the average (Rivista il Mulino, 2022).
Another factor that contributed to the rise of these protests is the lack of democracy: as mentioned above, Nazarbayev had been the only President of the country from independence until 2019. Furthermore, we can see the increase in inequality, the widespread corruption, injustice, lack of democracy and worsening of conditions also due to COVID-19, have contributed deeply in the rise of the protests.
4. How has the world reacted?
The facts of the first days of January have had an echo at the international level, with countries and regional and international institutions reacting to the event in different ways.
On the 5th of January, the press secretary for the Russian President Vladimir Putin, Dmitry Peskov, has said that Kazakhstan “can solve by [itself] the internal problems” and has assured that “Kazakhstan has not asked for Russian help” whilst, at the same time, urging that “no one from the outside (of Kazakhstan) should interfere in the matter” (РИА Новости, 2022). The same day, however, Armenian President Nikol Pashiyan, announced that the CSTO was ready to intervene (Al Jazeera, 2022). As mentioned before, these forces were deployed on the 6th of January, in what is the first mission of the Organization after its founding in 1994 (The Diplomat, 2022), effectively clashing with the declarations made by the Russian official.
Following their objective of maintaining peace and fostering human rights, the United Nations (UN) have had multiple contacts with Kazakh authorities, urging the latter to “exercise restraint, refrain from violence and promote dialogue to address the situation” (UN Geneva’s office, 2022). UN officials have, moreover, urged both protesters and local security forces to seek a peaceful resolution to the issue and respect due process for detainees, thus also asking for respect of their human and legal rights. The UN have also asked not to misuse terms such as, for example, “terrorists”, while referring to the protesters (OHCHR, 2022). They have, moreover, expressed concerns for the misuse of the UN peacekeepers’ blue helmets - seen to be worn in pictures taken during the protests - without a mandate of the UN Security Council (UN Secretary-General spokesman, 2022).
Western countries also have generally asked for a peaceful solution to the issue, and the respect of human rights of the protesters, such as rightful due diligence in the detainment process.
The European Union, in the person of the President of the European Commission, Ursula Von der Leyen, reiterated the urge to respect “human rights and security” calling for “an end to the violence and for restraint”, during a joint press conference in Paris, together with French president Emmanuel Macron (France24, 2022). Member states have also called on Russia to respect Kazakhstan’s sovereignty and its independence.
France and Germany have especially stressed the importance of de-escalating the situation, after Tokayev’s authorization to “fire on demonstrators without warning”. French Foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, and German government’s spokesperson, Christiane Hoffmann, have called “to show moderation and open dialogue” (Ouest France, 2022) and to “reach a peaceful solution to the situation” (Deutsche Welle, 2022).
The United States (US) have also called “for restraint by both the authorities and protestors”, and the Department of State’s Spokesperson, Ned Price, has also asked “to respect and defend […] human rights, and media freedom, including through the restoration of internet service” (US Department of State, 2022). Furthermore, Press Secretary, Jen Psaki, dismissed some claims that accused the US of driving the protests in the country, saying that they are “absolutely false and clearly part of Russian disinformation” (The White House, 2022).
On the other hand, in a message sent to president Tokayev, China’s President Xi Jinping praised the Kazakh government on the strong measures taken at “critical moments [that ] quickly calmed down the situation”, congratulating the former for his “sense of duty as a politician” expressing his will to increase cooperation with Kazakhstan. In a message sent to Tokayev, Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan joined his Chinese counterpart, in standing in solidarity with the Kazakhs “for the casualties caused by the riots” and declaring that the “Turkish government is ready to provide any assistance, if needed” (Daily Sabah, 2022). Belarus’ President Alexander Lukashenko also urged protesters in Kazakhstan to end demonstrations and reason with Kazakhstan’s leader. Lukashenko used the message also to highlight how the same faith had been avoided in Belarus following the 2020 election’s protests (Al Jazeera, 2022).
5. Conclusions
As has been analyzed in this paper, Kazakhstan’s protests of the first days of January derive from a general discontent of its people, connected to the vacuous process of democratization that the country has experienced since its independence. The slogans that protesters used are clear evidence of this. Some of these, referring to “the old man” are, in fact, a clear critique of Nazarbayev's management of the country, as much as they are of its successor’s.
January’s protests have been met by Tokayev in contradicting ways. On one side he has harshly condemned them and allowed an extreme use of force against the manifestants. On the other hand, he has fulfilled the protesters’ requests and has removed the government cabinet, appointing a new one, and has ousted Nazerbayev from the roles that he still held. Tokayev has, for example, taken his predecessor’s role as chief of the security council and as chair of the party. Some have seen this change as a shift of the country towards a more democratic and fair system. This could be true, but, on the other hand, we can not underestimate Nazerbayev’s influence in the country, that, even though he has formally lost its titles, still remains more than evident, thanks to the roles his family has inside the country’s most important political and economical institutions. The fact that the old leader has lost the official titles, therefore, could just be a façade, constructed to gain the population’s consensus.
The protests have, moreover, shown the international forum of alliances connected to Kazakhstan. Authoritarian regimes have greatly appreciated the repression of the protests that took place in the country and have highlighted the capacity of its leaders. Moreover, the support that Russia showed, by sending its troops through the CSTO, has reiterated the interest that the Russians have in the country. Exactly for this reason one would have expected that, once Russian President Vladimir Putin, after the invasion of Ukraine, asked his Kazakh counterpart to send some troops, Tokayev would have answered affirmatively. Instead, Kazakhstan has denied Russia’s request. He has, moreover also condemned the recoignance of the Luhansk People’s Republic (LNR) and the Donetsk People’s Republic (DNR) by Russia (NBC news, 2022).
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3 | Maybe true | Not confirmed; reasonably logical in itself; coherent with some other information on the topic |
4 | Uncertain | Not confirmed; possible but not logical in itself; no other information on the topic |
5 | Improbable | Not confirmed; not logical in itself; contradicts with other information on the topic |
6 | Not able to be evaluated | No basis to evaluate the validity of the information |
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