| No 5 | September to October 2007

KAZAKHSTAN | Trends in Conflict and Cooperation

After the landslide electoral victory of the (“The Fatherland’s Ray of Light”) party on 18 August 2007, the newly elected Majilis (the lower house of the Kazakhstani parliament) started to work on 2 September 2007, thereby enabling the constitutional amendments of May 2007 to become effective. The changes to the constitution aim to boost Kazakhstan’s standing as a democratic country and do not only transfer presidential powers to the Majilis but also allow President to run for president more than two times (FAST Update Kazakhstan 3/2007). The new Majilis exclusively consists of President Nazarbayev’s Nur Otan party, which claims to have more than one million supporters. After elections critics focused on the lack of political party pluralism in the Majilis. In response, President Nazarbayev exhorted the Majilis and the Nur Otan party, respectively, to represent the whole nation. He said that a single-party parliament provides a good “opportunity” to pass all the laws necessary for the country’s economic and political modernization. According to a newly introduced law, party members are not allowed to vote against the party line. The first task of the Majilis was to endorse Prime Minister Karim Masimov’s cabinet. In addition to the old ministers the Majilis confirmed a handful of new ministers; will serve as new Deputy Prime Minister, Berdibek Sapardayev as Labor and Social Protection Minister, Bakhyt Sultanov took over the tasks of Economy Minister and will serve as Minister of Energy and Mineral Resources. The opposition criticized the elections and the Nationwide Social Democratic Party reportedly filed over 400 lawsuits claiming that the elections were manipulated by the winners. However, all of their claims were dismissed. Towards the end of the reporting period the opposition became subject to increasing political censorship. On 24 October access to four opposition websites was blocked and publishing houses prevented the publication of four oppositional weekly newspapers. While Kazakh authorities have come up with various explanations for the restriction of freedom of speech, the most likely determinant is that all of them presented or planned to publish the RFE/RL’s Kazakh Service telephone interview with President Nazarbaev’s former son-in-law Rakhat Aliev, who currently lives in exile in Vienna. In this interview Aliev accused President Nazarbaev of arraigning the murder of Altynbek Sarsenbayev in 2006, the former leader of the opposition party Ak Zhol Democratic Party. During the Aliev’s interview, the broadcast quality unexpectedly dropped and the interview became nearly inaudible. While Aliev has refused to return from Vienna, the uproar around him has not diminished; at the beginning of November the state court started a trial against him. So far allegations against him include kidnapping, assault, corporate raiding and money laundering.

Since independence only a few inter-ethnic tensions (mainly with Muslim ethnicities) have been reported. During the reporting period, inter-ethnic clashes between ethnic Kurds living in Kazakhstan and ethnic Kazakhs took place. The confrontation erupted in October after an ethnic Kurd allegedly sexually assaulted a 4-year old Kazakh boy in the Southern Kazakh Toleby district. This incident was followed by tensions in the town; Kazakhs set three houses and several cars of ethnic Kurds on fire. Nadir Nadirov, the president of the association of the Kurdish people in Kazakhstan criticized the incident and blamed local authorities of “setting Kazakhs against Kurds” – an allegation that was declaimed by the regional governor. According to official statistics, there are some 46,000 Kurds in Kazakhstan. However, official data lists twice as many people.

The increase in commodity prices caused social turmoil among the citizens leading to small scale protest actions; on 20 October between 1,000-3,000 opposition members (government estimates vs. opposition estimates) protested in Almaty against the increase in living costs. Price increases of commodities were mostly visible in bread and vegetable oil prices but also in electricity. While the government tends to neglect the problem, several bread producers complain that they have run out of flour reserves. Explanations for the steady price increase vary from Kazakhstan’s uncontrolled grain export to an increase in world-wide food consumption and a decrease in the reliance of countries on their own food productivity. FAST Update | Kazakhstan | No 5 | September to October 2007

Kazakhstan’s future wealth is mostly dependent on the extortion and export of its huge oil reserves. However, the production expansion at Tengiz, one of the greatest oil discoveries in recent history, has been slowed down by Russians attempts to block the expansion of the export pipeline; and at Kashagan, the Italian ENI-Agip has been unable to continue its work due to the Kazakhstani government’s environmental considerations (FAST Update Kazakhstan 4/2007). In an attempt to facilitate the resumption of work at Kashagan, Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi and President Nazarbayev held talks in early October. Nazarbayev assured that his government will not change the operator at Kashagan if the ENI-Agip consortium meets its investment commitments. Kazakhstan’s more cooperative stance might originate from the government’s considerations that the strict policies towards foreign oil companies may harm its oil-dependent economy.

During the reporting period Kazakhstan continued to lobby for its OSCE chairmanship candidacy for 2009, on which a decision is expected to be reached at the OSCE Ministerial Council on 29-30 November in Madrid. During his speech at the OSCE on 20 September in Vienna Kazakhstan’s State Secretary Kanat Saudanbayev emphasized Kazakhstan’s role as a bridge-builder between the West and the Islamic world and between “the principles of democracy and the principles of realpolitik.” However, current developments concerning the electoral results and subsequent restrictions on freedom of speech (as mentioned above) weaken Kazakhstan’s chances to get the chairmanship. In addition, the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) of Transparency International released in September outlined continuing and increasing problems in the areas of government transparency and accountability. While the CPI worsened in all Central Asian countries, Kazakhstan’s CPI worsened the most (by half percent). Simultaneously Kazakhstan seems to be aware of its diminishing chances for the OSCE chairmanship and it is expected that it is ready to re-schedule its application for 2011. While Kazakhstan seems to be under pressure from the side of some OSCE member states, its cooperation with other Central Asian states appeared more fruitful. On 16 October, the second leadership summit of five littoral Caspian Sea nations (Azerbaijan, Iran, Russia, Turkmenistan and Kazakhstan) took place in Tehran. Current estimates indicate that the Caspian Sea possess one of the largest reserves of oil and natural gas, giving it particular strategic and economic importance. The summit was concluded by a declaration that called for peaceful conflict resolution among the Caspian littoral states and included an affirmation that the littoral countries will not allow their territory be used for military operations by third parties. However, the countries could not agree on the proposed trans-Caspian energy pipeline. While the governments of Russia and Iran argued that all the littoral countries were given a say on the construction of each pipeline, President Nazarbayev and President Ilham Aliyev of Azerbaijan declared their right to cooperate on the pipeline project without Russia’s and Iran’s approval.

The following weeks will show how the OSCE Ministerial Council will assess Kazakhstan's democratic record. If Kazakhstan would be granted the OSCE chairmanship, the nature of the organization will change. Russia has pushed for a long time for substantial changes within the OSCE: demanding a Complaints, criticism and protests against government (relative) shift in the organization’s regional and thematic orientation. Central Asian and country stability countries such as Kazakhstan have aligned with Russia. This "rapprochement" between the Central Asian countries alongside Russia has a wider perspective: Russia seeks intensified economic and military cooperation with its "near abroad" in the hope to gain back influence in the region. Kazakhstan, interested in attracting investors, has always been and continues to be a close alley of Russia. It, however, does not only rely on Russia but also on other potential strong investors. At the domestic level, despite few protests and complaints against the government (see graph), the price increases exacerbate tensions in the society and negative feelings towards the government. In order to prevent further tumult in the country,

Source: FAST event data the government would need to halt inflation and rapidly act against price hikes.

Contact FAST International is the early warning program of swisspeace, FAST International covering 25 countries/regions in Africa, Asia and Europe. Based in Country Team: Kazakhstan Bern, Switzerland, the program is funded and utilized by an Sonnenbergstrasse 17 international consortium of development agencies, including the 3000 Bern 7 Austrian Development Agency (ADA), the Canadian International Switzerland Development Agency (CIDA), the Swedish International Development [email protected] Cooperation Agency (Sida) and the Swiss Agency for Development and www.swisspeace.org Cooperation (SDC).