WHAT’S AHEAD OF KAZAKHSTAN?

The year 2022 began with yet another geopolitical cataclysm on the post-Soviet continent. Crisis in Kazakhstan will go down in history for the change of politicians, casualties as a result of the mass unrest, and suppression of protest actions, including with the assistance of Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) troops invited to the country. This is an incomplete picture of the turmoil experienced in the first half of January in a state, which has long been regarded as the most prosperous in Central Asia. It would be complete once these dramatic, if not tragic, events finally clarify Kazakhstan's position in Eurasian and global politics.

Rising prices, protests, and 'terrorists'

Large-scale protests that swept through the country in the first days of January ruined overnight the perception of Kazakhstan as a generally stable, steadily developing and even relatively prosperous country. They were triggered by dissatisfaction with rising prices for liquefied gas. But not only, if we take into account that the protests revealed a wide range of other socio-economic problems.

However, the socio-economic component of the protests, which is often the case in countries affected by such protests, was quickly replaced by political one. It even intensified the protest movement after the authorities made concessions by returning the energy prices to previous level, introducing the state regulation of prices for socially important goods, as well as a moratorium on the increase of utility rates for the population for the next 180 days. In addition, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev made a major political concession by dismissing the government. But most importantly, he announced the removal of the long-time leader of the country, former President Nursultan Nazarbayev, from the post of the Head of the Security Council and took up the post himself heralding the end of more than three decades of history in Kazakhstan.

Nevertheless, all these steps did almost nothing to calm passions. On the contrary, socio-economic demands grew to political demands for a complete change of power, with a number of Kazakh cities gripped by mass disturbances and clashes of protesters with the law enforcement. Almaty was the worst hit, having been transformed from a blooming city into ruins in just a few days...

The events prompted the incumbent President Tokayev to request support from the CSTO, which immediately reacted and deployed its collective peacekeeping troops in Kazakhstan. A legal background for the CSTO's military intervention was the external threat, an attack of foreign-trained terrorists and gangs on Kazakhstan. Many drew a parallel between the CSTO intervention in Kazakhstan and a number of military actions of the past. In the Azerbaijani expert community, in particular, it evoked associations with the invasion of Baku by the Soviet troops on 20 January 1990, which resulted in numerous civilian casualties.

Officially, the CSTO troops were to protect the strategically important facilities in Kazakhstan, while the suppression of ‘terrorists’ was directly handled by the Kazakh law enforcement agencies. Either way, it was after the CSTO troops were deployed that the protests were suppressed. In a few days, the authorities took control of the unrest-torn cities and other populated areas. The clashes resulted in casualties among both protesters and the law enforcement, several thousand protesters were detained...

Thus, the plan was to resolve the crisis in Kazakhstan by force, with the involvement of foreign military forces. Yet what was the main reason of the crisis? Did internal or external factors play a decisive role in the crisis?

End of the power duality

Obviously, the main cause of the crisis in the largest post-Soviet and Central Asian country was social protest and internal political struggle within the ruling elite, when certain powers within the Kazakh authorities decided to settle their political problems through the exploitation of protest sentiments using a large part of the population. In a country where traditional inter-clan relations play an instrumental role in the exercise of power, political actions that threaten that power would be virtually impossible if not for the underlying contradictions and even divisions within the power structure itself. That is why experts do not rule out a de facto revolt by part of the Kazakh elite against the long-standing domination of the Senior Zhuz—a group of relative communities from the southern of Kazakhstan—in the power.

Undoubtedly, the key domestic political reason for the crisis was closely associated with the processes unfolding around the transit of power back in 2019, when Kassym-Jomart Tokayev took the reign as Nazarbayev's successor. However, the shadow of Yelbasi (Nazarbayev) had been looming behind the new president for the past three years. It is difficult to say what was the direct factor that triggered the internal power struggles and put an end to the period of de-facto duality of power. Perhaps the strange behaviour of Nazarbayev himself, who preferred to remain silent and unnoticeable during the days of bloody riots and the resolution of the crisis after external military intervention, would answer this question. However, the position of the power structures, some of which actually sided with the protesters giving a green light to the most radical participants of actions confirmed the actual split within the government itself. In fact, it was this factor that helped overcome the situation, when President Tokayev, who understood that he could lose control over the army and police, decided to request assistance from the CSTO.

Remarkably, hours before Tokayev's appeal to the CSTO, the Kremlin assured in the ability of the Kazakh authorities to solve their internal problems on their own. The spokesperson of the Russian president, Dmitry Peskov, even made a categorical statement that the Kazakh leadership had not requested assistance from Russia due to the situation in the country. However, it did not take long before the Kazakh side made such a request. President Tokayev agreed to let the foreign military troops into the country, which gave rise to widely different assessments of the geopolitical content and meaning of the upheaval in Kazakhstan in early January 2022.

The West, Eurasianism, the Turkic world

Deployment of the CSTO troops in Kazakhstan has prompted many global media outlets and political experts to talk about Russia's intention to reanimate the Soviet Union in whatever form. Proponents of this theory believe that the crisis in Kazakhstan was originally planned by Moscow to finally consolidate its position in this largest Central Asian country and one of the most influential in the post-Soviet space, to tear it away from the multi-vector policy of the Nazarbayev era and finally to draw Kazakhstan into the Union State, with Russia and Belarus being its only members.

Meanwhile, the Russians promoted a popular theory of the Western involvement in the Kazakh events to explain the reason behind the CSTO intervention to prevent yet another ‘colour revolution’ against the interests of Russia with the inevitable slide of Kazakhstan into chaos and anarchy. In this context, President Vladimir Putin made a notable statement at an extraordinary meeting of the CSTO Collective Security Council held on January 10. After calling the incidents in Kazakhstan as yet another ‘attempt of Maidan’ in the post-Soviet space, Mr. Putin said that Russia "will not allow the situation to be rocked at home and to implement scenarios of coloured revolutions". At the same time, the CSTO has officially and definitively confirmed the repulsion of a ‘terrorist attack’ and ‘external interference’ in Kazakhstan as a motive of its intervention.

Incidentally, the West’s reaction to the events in Kazakhstan was rather weak. The US Secretary of State, Anthony Blinken, condemned Tokayev's order to ‘shoot to kill’ and demanded the Kazakh president explain why it was necessary to involve the CSTO. Josep Borrell, the EU High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy, posted a similar statement on Twitter.

The analysis of the geopolitical aspect of events in Kazakhstan should be viewed not only in the context of the global and intensifying confrontation between Russia and the West, but also in the context of the growing activation in the Turkic world. Russian strategists and pro-Kremlin analysts insist that the Eurasian integration promoted by Moscow in the post-Soviet space is in conflict with the integration of the Turkic states. This can explain a lot in terms of the causes and driving forces behind the Kazakhstani crisis.

The summit of Turkic countries held last November in Istanbul, where the Turkic Council was transformed into the Organisation of Turkic States (OTS), effectively marked the emergence of a new integration centre on the world political map. It was also Azerbaijan's victory in the 44-day war with strong political and moral support from Turkey and other Turkic countries that triggered the event. Moreover, Nursultan Nazarbayev has personally played a major role in the development of solidarity among the Turkic nations and has always underlined the just position of Azerbaijan in the conflict with Armenia. Nazarbayev’s role as one of the drivers and organisers of integration in the post-Soviet Eurasia was in no way at odds with his efforts to implement similar integration processes in the Turkic world. It was also clear that one of the pillars of the OTS was Kazakhstan, a key state in the Great Turkic Steppe.

It is not surprising that amid the CSTO intervention in Kazakhstan, Russian political circles began talking with satisfaction about the collapse of the Great Turan project, separation of Kazakhstan from the Turkic world and other ‘successful accomplishments’ that fit the imperial clichés attributed to the Kremlin and which, in fact, are the biggest obstacle to Eurasian integration.

On January 11, the day when an emergency meeting of the foreign ministers of the CSTO countries was held, the Kazakh President Tokayev made a statement on the gradual withdrawal of CSTO troops from the country over the next ten days. There have also been mixed statements from Moscow on this matter. Russian Defence Minister Sergei Shoigu said that "the Collective Peacekeeping Forces will fulfil their mission until the situation in Kazakhstan is completely stabilised.” Spokesman Dmitry Peskov noted that Russia had no right to interfere in the "analysis" of the timing of the withdrawal of the CSTO peacekeepers, which is a prerogative of the Kazakh leadership. Despite various speculations on the same topic in the media, statements from the CSTO representatives that followed confirmed Mr. Tokayev’s words however.

It is difficult to confirm or deny whether it was a coincidence that Tokayev announced the imminent withdrawal of the CSTO troops from Kazakhstan on the day of the OTS summit or not. It will be clear later. Also, we yet to know whether or not the resolution of the political crisis in Kazakhstan will be followed by obedience to the Kremlin's strategy, as many experts believe. Correspondingly, this also weakens the allegations of Russia's successful drive to reanimate the USSR. Even without the problems associated with the crisis in Kazakhstan, this version has a very significant point of contention: does modern Russia has enough political, economic, and ideological resources to fully reanimate a certain form union on the vast post-Soviet geographic space?

At a meeting of the foreign ministers of the OTS member states initiated by Turkey and chaired by the Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu, participants expressed their "readiness to provide the necessary support to the leadership and people of Kazakhstan to overcome the crisis". They also voiced support for the "anti-terrorist actions of the government of Kazakhstan" and for President Tokayev's decision to carry out reforms in the country.

By the way, for the first time Azerbaijan announced its official position on the events in Kazakhstan at this meeting. Reaffirming the respect for Kazakhstan's sovereignty and territorial integrity, and demonstrating an interest in an early normalisation of the situation in the fraternal country, Azerbaijani Foreign Minister Ceyhun Bayramov said that "the illegal use of force and violence, which undermines public order and threatens fundamental human rights and civil liberties, cannot be justified and must therefore be strongly condemned and rejected.”

Mr. Bayramov expressed hope that common sense would prevail in Kazakhstan. "We believe that Kazakhstan will be able to get out of the current situation without jeopardizing the important achievements that this country has made since independence," Interfax-Azerbaijan reported.

According to the minister, OTS has an important responsibility in stabilising the situation in Kazakhstan. "The organisation is based on the solidarity of member states and it is our shared responsibility to support our Kazakh brothers and sisters in these difficult times,” Mr. Bayramov said.

Remarkably, the OTS has not voiced a single objection against the CSTO intervention in Kazakhstan or the Eurasian integration. It means that we will get the following crucial question answered as soon as the geopolitical situation in and around Kazakhstan clarifies: are the ideas of Eurasianism and Turkic unity so contradictory, as some circles in Russia obsessed with the notion of imperialism to the detriment of the civilisational code of the geographic space they are going to integrate claim? A space, one of the pillars of which is the Turkic-Muslim community...