In Almaty, Kazakhstan, a local court has ordered a record amount of moral compensation to be paid to the ‘victims’ of a poster showing Russian national poet Alexander Pushkin kissing the Kazakh national composer Kurmangazy. This ‘kiss of the titans’ has spurred much homophobic sentiment in the country.

If the court case hadn’t been initiated, the advertisers would have had to invent it. But Kazakhstan would do well to forget about this case, as the stereotypes found in the film Borat may otherwise begin to materialise in real life.

An Almaty district court issued a landmark decision in September regarding the Kazakh international advertising network Havas Worldwide (formerly Euro RSCG). After seeing the banner of Pushkin and Kurmangazy, 34 students and teachers from Kurmangazy Kazakh National Conservatoire in Almaty filed a lawsuit against Havas. The outraged teachers and students demanded compensation to the tune of one million tenge each (roughly $5,500).

Outraged politicans and patriots

The stereotypes found in the film Borat may otherwise begin to materialise in real life.

The poster of the iconic figures embracing made its first appearance on Facebook in August. The banner was intended to promote the Almaty gay club Studio 69, which is located at the intersection of Kurmangazy Street and Pushkin Street. Inspired by Russian artist Dmitry Vrubel’s famous mural on the Berlin Wall (‘The Kiss between Honecker and Brezhnev,’ otherwise known as the ‘Fraternal Kiss’), the poster provoked a flurry of ‘warm words,’ directed largely at the LGBT community of Kazakhstan. Havas had designed the poster for the Central Asian annual Red Jolbors advertising festival in Bishkek, Kyrgyzstan; and it soon found that it was the focus of public ire. Meanwhile, the festival organisers praised Havas’ design and the jury awarded them a bronze medal in the ‘outdoor advertising’ category.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The Fraternal Kiss between Leonid Brezhnev and Enrich Honecker. Image CC German Federal Archive

While the public expressed its dismay on social networks, the more practical among them — a group of ‘patriots’ — reported the ‘offence’ to the police. Before this, Havas Worldwide Kazakhstan had apologised for the fuss on their Facebook page:

‘The image was not used for outdoor advertising and was not intended to be posted anywhere. It only serves to publicise the intersection where this club is located. We offer our sincere apologies to those who have been offended or shocked by this design. We recognise the invaluable contribution to Kazakh culture made by the great Russian poet and great Kazakh composer and we officially announce that this print will not be posted, printed or published in the mainstream media.’

And with this post, the agency obviously thought the matter was settled.

Meanwhile, law enforcement officers failed to find grounds for criminal charges (especially since the management of Studio 69 was unaware of what had happened), and sent their findings to the city administration. The club, which unwittingly found itself at the centre of attention, was closed down for a week while the case was being investigated. But this did not stop blogger and PR expert Nurken Khalykbergen from holding a picket along with his supporters outside the club. Khalykbergen considers himself the great-nephew of Kurmangazy,

‘My first wish was to punch them in the face. It’s an insult. I’m going to demand compensation for moral damages,’ Mr Khalykbergen stated with regard to his immediate future plans. With this plan in mind, the outraged blogger filed for moral damages in a district court. However, Mr Khalykbergen failed to prove his relationship to Kurmangazy and the court rejected his claim.

City Hall, on the other hand, was rather upset, and sent an administrative violation report to the court. With that, the advertising affair, which would have been otherwise quickly forgotten, was taken to a whole new level. The court was concerned by the city administration’s inability to explain exactly how Havas had ‘distributed goods banned from public advertisement.’ The judge also failed to find evidence of an offence, but was unable to go against the implicit wishes of the city authorities; and thus, on 24 September, the court decided to penalise the advertising agency and its director with a $2,000 fine for violating advertising law .

‘It is a great pity that ugly activities take place in our flourishing country. Frankly, these are inhuman actions’

Perhaps it was comments made by the Kazakh Minister of Culture, which prompted the court’s evaluation:

‘It is a great pity that ugly activities take place in our flourishing country. Frankly, these are inhuman actions. Alexander Sergeevich Pushkin and Kurmangazy are titans of world culture. Of course, using iconic personalities on some kind of street poster is unacceptable. To a certain extent, we are talking about a crime here.’ The Minister subsequently warned that the ‘cultured ministry’ would take the necessary steps to resolve the issue.

Coloured trousers

Aside from the chance to make a quick financial profit, the ‘patriotic’ community saw the chance to use the situation for their own ends.

On 11 September, the youth movement Bolashak ('Future'), held a round table in Almaty together with Kommunist Kazakhstana (the Communist People’s Party of Kazakhstan, an alternative opposition communist party). Making extremely vague statements against ‘sodomites’ (and not for the first time), the young activists requested that parliament quickly pass a law against LGBT propaganda.

The head of Bolashak, Dauren Babamuratov, informed the public that 100,000 Kazakhs had signed a petition in favour of banning LGBT propaganda. Later, however, in an interview with Kommunist Kazakhstana, Babamuratov reduced the number of signatories by a factor of ten.

The Bolashak movement appears to operate under the wing of City Hall and the intelligence services. Babamuratov denies these allegations, and says that Bolashak works in close co-operation with the support of the Soros Foundation.

But feeling the support of ‘100,000 angry citizens’ as he sat at the round table, M. Babamuratov shared his pain with the audience.

'In 2012, Almaty was named the gay capital of Central Asia by the international gay community’ he said. He also told sympathisers how to identify ‘suspicious characters’ among ordinary people: they wear coloured trousers.

Oktem Altayev, a fellow composer of Kurmangazy, also spoke out. According to Altayev, more and more gay people are appearing on the Kazakh variety scene, and as a result, they must be banned from performing on stage.

But the audience did not agree with such limited restrictions, and proposed to ban gays and lesbians from working in public organisations, schools, universities, and serving in the army.

The audience proposed to ban gays and lesbians from working in public organisations, schools, and serving in the army

Nagashbai Esmurza, a prominent self-publicist, brought the event to its logical conclusion. Esmurza shot to fame after writing an article entitled ‘Hitler was not a fascist’, which appeared in a special issue of a Kazakh magazine devoted entirely to the ‘legendary historical figure.’

Esmurza proposed to transfer ‘queers’ from the ‘category of patients to the category of criminals;' and then to act in the tradition of the Führer, and punish them, even to the point of capital punishment.

The few participants who spoke out against such measures were quickly expelled from the hall by Babamuratov himself; it seems the ‘great-nephew’ of Kurmangazy was not the only one who wished to ‘physically convince’ his sexual opponents. Babamuratov explained this noble, human act simply by saying, ‘the fact that gays have come to this round table makes the blood of the people here boil. They want to take matters into their own hands.’

A dangerous precedent

In October a new private law suit was filed against the advertising company. Thirty four students and teachers of the Kurmangazy Conservatoire, as well as members of the Kurmangazy orchestra, outraged by the poster, demanded precisely one million tenge each. While the conservatoire sent journalists to the administrative court for comment, the judicial hearings somehow took place in the absence of the defendants. For some reason, the Almalinsky district court did not trouble itself to investigate exactly how the compensation figure of one million tenge was reached; and on 27 October, made its ruling: to satisfy the claimants’ material demands in full, force the advertisers to issue a public apology, and seize the advertising company’s property.

Havas Worldwide says that it does not have that amount of money. The ‘victims’ themselves said very little, explaining that the whole idea had not been theirs, but they had received their orders from the authorities and the mayor's office, which was coordinating the attacks on the gay population and the advertisers.

Or its part, the organising committee of Red Jolbors Fest announced: 'The committee believes that the question of ethics is ambiguous. But at the advertising festival, professional competence comes first, and attitudes towards the LGBT community were not taken into account. We consider that the court finding in favour of the students and teachers of the conservatoire was a political decision and unreasonable. To our mind, the complainants failed to make a convincing case and did not provide proof of either physical or psychological damage. A dangerous precedent has been created, which can later be used against people from the creative industries, where someone considers a creative product offensive or objectionable.'

Journalist Zhanar Erkebaeva expresses this same opinion, having repeatedly advocated support for the advertising company:

'If the subject under discussion is neither kissing, which can be friendly or brotherly, and doesn't have to be just sexual, or the provocative nature of art, then one thing is clear to me. We can all take offence tomorrow for whatever reason and file lawsuits on each other. For example, someone might object to the noise on Furmanov Street and decide to seek out descendants of Furmanov who will want to ban traffic there. Here we have 34 people who are going to receive a million each. I think this undermines the authority of educational establishments. We are on our way back to our recent past – the Soviet mentality, with its censorship and people making judgements about art who know nothing about it. An artist coming to power is not the only thing, which is scary. Flag-waving patriots making decisions about art – and the Kurmangazy-Pushkin poster is art in my opinion – is just as frightening.'

‘We are on our way back to our recent past – the Soviet mentality, with its censorship and people making judgements about art.

However, not all flag-waving patriots have given the 'Bolashaks' their unequivocal support. One of the leaders of the 'Antigeptil' movement from Astana, Ulan Shamshet, who makes no secret of his patriotic views, turned down Babamuratov’s suggestion that they should join their anti-LGBT coalition, and told him in no uncertain terms where to go. As Ulan Shamshet said himself on his Facebook page, his face-to-face meeting with the leader of 'Bolashak' on neutral territory ended in a bit of a scuffle.

The size of the payments caused an additional flurry of public indignation on social networks. As users correctly pointed out, relatives of people killed by the reckless driving of drunken officials or victims of torture would receive less compensation, and then only in exceptional cases. Indeed, the ‘kiss of the titans’ was for some time the most discussed subject in the Kazakh media, overtaking the topic of joining the Eurasian Union. The trial is being compared to the Pussy Riot case. And the 'bad' poster re-posts can be counted in the tens of thousands – the unwitting 'Bolashak' propagandists and the city administration have thus rendered the LGBT community of Kazakhstan an invaluable service.

The ‘kiss of the titans’ was for some time the most discussed subject in the Kazakh media

Last week, it emerged that one of Pushkin’s descendants, who lives in Belgium and heads the A. S. Pushkin Foundation, wants to sue those who sullied his great-grandfather’s honour. Although it seems hardly likely that Alexander Sergeevich, a great connoisseur of jokes and frivolity himself, would have been in favour of his name being taken in vain, to make trouble for people who are stirring up public opinion.

But it was the International Olympic Committee, which dealt the city authorities and their associates in the fight for moral purity the most unexpected blow. Only Beijing and Almaty are in the running to host the 2022 Winter Olympic Games. Now the IOC has suddenly announced that future Olympic host countries must adhere to the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, and must not interfere in gay pride parade events.

What then can Almaty do? What would Borat do? Perhaps ask the 'Bolshaks' to wear coloured trousers.

Standfirst Image via Havas Worldwide Kazakhstan, posted to Facebook. 

This article orignally appeared in Russian on Fergana News

For the last 3 years the Kazakh government has been declaring to its people that the country's assumption of the chair of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) in 2010 signals Kazakhstan's growing importance in the world. It will be the first of the post-Soviet states to do so.

Given the importance the government clearly attaches to this impending event, how has it been preparing to take the helm of an organisation whose objectives include ensuring ‘full respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; to abide by the rule of law'? Have relations between the Kazakh government and the media, which have been stormy in recent years, been improving?

A review of recent developments is sobering. There was the three-year prison term served on Ramazan Yesergepov, editor-in-chief of the independent weekly Alma-Ata Info on 8 August 2009. He was arrested on 6 January 2009 by armed, masked security officers while being treated for hypertension at the Cardiology Institute in Almaty. The charge of "illegal gathering and dissemination of state secrets" stem from an article he published on 21 November 2008 entitled 'Who rules the Country - the President or the CNS?' The article is said to deal with a tax fraud allegation involving a local prosecutor and a judge. The CNS, or Committee of National Security, is Kazakhstan's KGB.

Yesergepov, who comes from the small town Taraz, was also prosecuted for the disclosure of an official letter from the head of the local CNS.  This letterincluded in article on the local wine and vodka factory and detailed actions to be taken against the management. The management claimed that these actions amounted to a hostile takeover.  Evgeny Zhovtis, director of Kazakhstan's Bureau of International Human Rights and the Rule of Law, testified that nothing in the memos supported the charge that Yesergepov had disclosed official secrets. But the testimony of the CNS proved stronger and the journalist was sent down.  The signal was clear: Yesergepov was being punished to warn others off crossing the CNS.

Next the authorities targeted Yesergepov's defender, Evgeny Zhovtis. In July Zhovtis was involved in an accident at night on a deserted road, in which a man was killed. He was given a 4-year prison sentence on 4 September. "Political considerations led the court to ignore openly the country's legislation" declared a well-known Kazakhstan journalist, Sergei Dubanov. "Evgenii Zhovtis' defence was given 40 minutes to prepare for the presentation of their case, so they refused to to present. The judge withdrew and in 30 minutes came out with a prepared verdict.  How do we know the verdict was prepared?  Because it would have been impossible to type it all up in 30 minutes". Dubanov has his own reasons for not trusting the courts. After publishing a series of articles on ‘Kazakhgate', he was himself first accused of defaming President Nursultan Nazarbayev, then of raping an underage girl.

According to Zhovtis' defence lawyer, the proceedings were so full of procedural infringements that "it's hard to see it as anything but a farce and political reprisal against a public activist well-known both inside and outside the country". For the last 20 years Zhovtis has indeed been a leading opponent of the illegal actions of the regime. He has led the chorus of those insisting that Kazakhstan must comply with the standards of the OSCE if it is going to take the chair.

Zhovtis also chairs a foundation called Bota, a post to which he was nominated because of his impeccable reputation in Kazakhstan and beyond. The foundation was entrusted with distributing $84 mln which the US government confiscated in 1999, because it suspected that it had been criminally acquired.  Only after trying unsuccessfully to get its hands on the money did the Kazakh government finally admit that its provenance was criminal. 

The foundation was about to start disbursing these funds for educational purposes and to help poor families. Conveniently, Zhovtis's imprisonment also serves to paralyse the charity just as it was due to start operating. The selection of another president will take some time.

The relationship between the newspaper Respublikaand the Kazakh government has never been an easy one.  When it opened in 2000, the staff were greeted at the door with funeral wreaths, sent by ‘admirers', plus the severed head of a dog with the note saying ‘You're next'.

Since then there has been an arsonattempt and a string of court cases. The latest was brought by the BTA Bank, which claimed that an article in Respublika had prompted customers to withdraw $40 mln from the bank. The plaintiffs could furnish no proof that the withdrawals were a response to the article, or even that they had happened after its publication.  But the paper lost the case and was ordered to pay $500,000 in compensation. On 18 September, when the court ruling took effect, the paper's print run was seized, as were the bank accounts of its owner and its publisher. 

The chair of Respublika's editorial board, Irina Petrushova, maintains that the bank brought the case at the behest of a 'higher body', in order to close the paper down.  The period for appealing the court decision ran out on 24 September and on that day the print run was seized. Hürriyet Daily News reported  Respublika  as saying:.  "Despite this technical censorship, we continue to work. The newspaper is coming out and in just the same way as before."

Since April, the independent the newspaper's internet site http://www.respublika.kz/ and another online news outlet http://www.zona.kz/ have also been repeatedly subjected to hacking and cyber attacks, some on a scale requiring tens of thousands of linked computers. No such attacks have been sustained by government-controlled websites.

On the legislative front, a new law has also been passed recently which subjects all material on the internet- from online shops to blogs - to the same constraints as the media.  Now a new media law is on the way. One of the most dangerous of the Ministry of the Interior's proposals is that journalists should be held responsible for ‘disseminating slanderous information on the private lives of individuals'.  This would effectively prevent the media from reporting anything about the amoral behaviour or abuses of power of public figures.

The closer the Kazakh government gets to assuming the chair of the OSCE, the more determined it seems to be to show that it can do without even the pretence of abiding by the rule of law.

On 4 July Russian TV aired a documentary about Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko. It was a programme that soon sent shockwaves around media and political circles. The programme itself was nothing special and the facts it revealed were hardly unfamiliar to people who follow politics. Its resonance had everything to do with timing and context, preceding as it did an agreement on Customs Union between Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, which was due to be signed in Astana, Kazakhstan the very next day.

The documentary’s title — “Krestny Batka” (“The Nation’s Godfather”) — dropped some obvious hints. Few educated readers could have failed to make the connection between “Batka” (“father of the nation”, a title Lukashenko openly enjoys) and Francis Ford Coppola’s cinematic masterpiece. The documentary itself matched the opening hints, presenting the leader of Belarus (considered by many Russians to be a brotherly nation) as a tyrant and criminal. He was, according to the programme, someone who not only crushes democratic opposition, but also liquidates political rivals with the assistance of professional killers from the secret services. Anyone who watched “Krestny Batka” could only have reached one conclusion: Lukashenko’s uninterrupted position as president since 1994 was the result of a blatant and systematic infringement of democratic norms

NTV's Lukashenko documentary (trailer in Russian)

Viewers of another revelatory film about Lukashenko, shown the same evening on the English-language channel “Russia Today” (a propaganda weapon of the Kremlin) were no doubt expected to come to a similar conclusion.

By interesting contrast, the next day Russian Channel One broadcast another documentary, this time about Kazakhstan president Nursultan Nazarbaev. Nazarbaev has been president for even longer than Lukashenko, and is just as relaxed about adjusting democratic norms in order to stay in power. Yet this programme chose to show Nazarbaev in an exclusively positive light: as a wise person, a worthy ruler and wonderful family man.

There can be no coincidence to the fact that these three films were shown at the same time, just before the summit in Astana. If we were to borrow a phrase from Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Treasure Island”, it would seem that through its actions, the Kremlin was sending Lukashenko a “black spot”: a symbol depicting his impending death. While in our case, we can only be talking in the metaphorical sense, it would certainly appear that the Kremlin has to all extents signed off on the Belarussian president as a politician they can do business with.

To understand why, we must first look at the background to the Customs Union.

Customs Union or Customs Anschluss?

Russia has, since the collapse of the USSR in 1991, undertaken various efforts aimed at restoring cooperation between post-Soviet nations. Initially, the CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) was created for this purpose. Many actually believed that this Commonwealth would go some way to replacing the USSR. In fact, it was a complete sham. The Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) did not join the CIS at all, preferring to move towards joining the European Union. Some member countries had openly hostile relations with each other, for example Armenia and Azerbaijan, later Russia and Georgia (which left the CIS following the August 2008 War).

Another attempt to restore cooperation in the post-Soviet area lay in the formation of a Union State of Russia and Belarus. No unified state was actually ever created, but for a long time Lukashenko used declarations about the intention to create one as a way of gaining economic favours from Moscow.

Unlike the CIS and the Union State, the Customs Union appears a real and potentially quite useful innovation. Removing customs barriers between the three nations could help foster competition and a regional market economy. The signing of the agreement in Astana is perhaps the first real success story of economic integration for some two decades. That does not mean we should overestimate its significance. While political leaders and the official media often talk a great deal about it, society and the independent press do not share their enthusiasm.

There are at least two reasons for this.

The first is the unequal economic weight of the members of the union. Russia’s GDP, for example, is more than 12 times higher than that of Kazakhstan (and more than 25 times higher than that of Belarus). Even by population, Russia is almost 10 times larger than Kazakhstan and more than 15 times larger than Belarus. So, for all the theoretical significance of the Customs Union, in practical terms little will change (at least not for Russia). What will happen is not so much unification of three markets, rather that the Russian market will simply become somewhat stronger.

Certainly, there is very little to compare the formation of Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan with the development of the European Economic Community, which was the foundation of the present European Union. It would seem to have more in common with the Customs Union of the 1830s, formed by Prussia in German lands. Here, one large nation signed a number of small nations into its economic orbit. In Germany at the time, there was talk of a customs “Anschluss” (annexation).  We could with some reason use same term today to describe the relations between Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus (the analogy is also useful for newspaper editors since, in Russian, the word for union – “soyuz”­ – and “Anschluss” rhyme).

A second reason not to overestimate the significance of the Customs Union is in many ways the opposite point to the one we have made. The political leaders and national elites of Kazakhstan and Belarus are prepared to receive economic advantages from the unification, but they object with all their might to subordinating their countries to Russia. The political stand-off between the Kremlin and Lukashenko has, in particular, become extremely serious of late.  This forms the background to “Krestny Batka”.

The disobedient Batka

In the most part, conflicts between the Kremlin and Russia stem from the fact Russia has essentially for some time been subsidizing the Belarussian economy; and has also for some time expected certain favours in exchange for this. What exactly these favours are is difficult to say. Political bargaining between Russia and Belarus has never been carried out in the open. But we can suppose “Belarussian services” to the Kremlin might fall into one of two categories:

The first category is political services. On the one hand, Belarus is not an overly influential political force, and cannot therefore offer Russia significant support on important issues. On the other hand, Lukashenko himself claimed he had, for example, been asked to officially recognise Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent nations. There are reasons to believe him. Russia was clearly embarrassed over the (lack of) international recognition of these two republics, supported at the time only by Venezuela, Nicaragua and Nauru (which only underlined the isolation of Moscow in world opinion). Lukashenko did not oblige the Kremlin on this occasion

Of course, we cannot be sure if Moscow really asked Lukashenko to recognise Abhazia and South Ossetia. It is also possible that Belarussian president made it all up in order to demonstrate to the West his tenacity in a supposed battle with Russia’s imperial ambitions. But we may confidently assume that, in principle, Moscow would much prefer to subsidise a country that is ready to toe the line when it comes to delicate issues of this kind.

The second category of services is economic in nature. The Russian state and dependent companies would clearly benefit greatly from privileged access to privatization tenders. Of particular interest are Belarus’ Europe-destined gas and oil pipelines, as well as Soviet-era oil-processing factories. Lukashenko has not, however, been prepared to grant Russia the conditions it seeks. Russia would particularly like to increase its influence over the Belarusian gas transit company Beltransgaz, for example (Gazprom already owns 50%).

Lukashenko is also constantly engaged in political manoeuvres. He sometimes pretends to make compromises to the Kremlin, but in reality limits himself to minimal, extracted concessions. The Belarussian president does not want to share his power with the rulers from Moscow.

It seems that, at last, the Kremlin has grown tired of such manoeuvres.

A month ago, Gazprom dramatically reduced the supply of gas to Belarus, demanding that Lukashenko pay off debts it claimed were owed. Now, with the help of a television film, a blow has been dealt not to Belarus as a whole, but to the president of this country, and very personally. Judging by the power of this blow, one could surmise that Moscow wants to bring Lukashenko to his knees. Perhaps, even, it is trying to remove him from his presidential post (the next presidential elections are due to be held in Belarus next year).

How firm is Lukashenko’s position, then?

On the one hand, Lukashenko is undoubtedly trapped in a corner. He still has no money to pay for fuel, as the Belarussian economy is in a poor state. Moscow may also turn off the gas again right before elections, and thus undermine “Batka’s” popularity. Since the “last dictator in Europe” has such a bad reputation in the West, there is little likelihood he will receive financial support from the EU.

On the other hand, the mechanisms for removing Lukashenko are not immediately clear. When the Kremlin quarreled with former president Viktor Yushchenko, for example, it simply began bankrolling the political opposition in the person of Viktor Yanukovich. In Belarus, owing to Lukashenko’s authoritarian methods of rule, there is simply no opposition outlet able to command the support of a significant section of the population.

Moreover, while it might well be possible to remove Lukashenko — he has, after all, quarreled with the entire world with the exception Hugh Chavez — creating a stable democratic regime in Belarus will surely prove more difficult. Belarus is no Kyrgyzstan, but recent events there have aptly demonstrated how the departure of an authoritarian leader combined with the absence of strong government can create serious problems.

There can’t be many places worthy of the epithet ‘former seaside town’. Indeed, Moynaq, now miles from any water, hasn’t moved an inch. What has happened is the shoreline has simply receded by 40 km. Along with Aralsk, Kazalinsk, Uchsai and Bugun, the only reminder of the sea is in the ubiquitous remains of the good old days: the beached boats, the rotting tackle and the eerie placards hailing the goodness of water and the importance of fishing to the Soviet economy.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Once a thriving seaside resort, Moynaq now only attracts tourism of a morbid nature. Photograph (cc) Giladr

Once Moynaq was more than just economically prosperous.

It was a famous holiday resort, the Crimea of Central Asia. In summer, several flights a day brought Soviet citizens to the beach. At the time, writer Viktor Vitkovich described the Aral Sea as ‘exceedingly pure, as deep and delicate as aquamarine, but without the touch of green, as intense and bright as Badakhshan azurite, and as translucent as sapphire’. The entire town lived and worked with the sea and its related industries, packing and canning. Without the sea, the town was as good as dead, and I did wonder how a town with no means of livelihood and almost 100 per cent unemployment could be anything other than that. The only vague hope for Moynaq was tourism, but even that wasn’t exactly the healthy kind.

‘May I ask,’ enquired the driver, ‘what are you doing in Moynaq?’

‘Business,’ said Bohodir.

‘Oh,’ he said, knowing full well there was no business in Moynaq.

Bohodir and I found a yellow Moskvich at the Qongirat taxi rank. The engine growled, then died. A sigh, a clatter of instruments, and soon we were gliding through cotton flats and scrub.

‘May I ask,’ enquired the driver, ‘what are you doing in Moynaq?’

‘Business,’ said Bohodir.

‘Oh,’ he said, knowing full well there was no business in Moynaq.

As we drove along the cotton petered out and the farmed flats turned to wasteland. The salt patches weren’t so prevalent here. These were cotton plantations, desperately watered, leached and watered again and the air was humid with evaporation. On the approach to Moynaq we spotted some artificial lakes, great dug-out bowls that had been filled with imported water and fish to give the fishermen something to do. It was a stab at rescuing Moynaq, but it wasn’t enough.

At last the sign came: ARAL KHOSH KELDINIZ (WELCOME TO ARAL). This was the part I’d been waiting for. We’d scarcely glanced at the town before the taxi driver had skidded off with a spray of sand. There were no customers in Moynaq. Bohodir and I stood together in the main street. As we hoisted up our bags, we noticed the deathly quiet. There was just no one around, no cars, no sound. It was like a Sunday afternoon in mid­summer, when everyone should be away – but holidays were a luxury no one could afford. Everyone was still here. So where were they? The wind swirled the sand and the odd bit of metal clacked, increasing the silence. But there was no birdsong. The road ran straight ahead between two rows of run-down housing, the tarmac obscured by drifts of sand that crept silently.

Bohodir and I started the trudge to the hotel, passing one or two bent-backed women with babies.

‘Where are the men?’ I asked him.

‘In Kazakhstan, mostly,’ he said. ‘They send money home. Keeps Moynaq alive. Same in Qongirat.’

The population of (supposedly) 9,000 had been whittled down to a few mothers and children. The only men I could see were a crowd of puffy-faced drinkers at the taxi rank.

It felt like walking through a film set: a broken tractor on its side, a train carriage rotting on the street, miles from its track, bleached skiffs parked on the pavement, their wood split and tackle rotten. I recalled that Morrissey lyric, ‘This is the coastal town. That they forgot to close down . . . Come, Armageddon! Come!’

Most astonishing were the placards. These were a fixture of Central Asia, it seemed. All of Karakalpakstan was hung with signs, messages from Karimov, pearls of wisdom on nation­hood, happiness and unity, as if only the father of the nation knew the answer. This was an enduring legacy of the Soviet era, and it was patriarchal and patronising at the best of times. But here, in the context of what had happened, it was unbelievable. Every few metres hung another placard. Bohodir translated as we passed: ‘WATER IS THE SOURCE OF LIFE’, ‘LABOUR LEADS TO JOY’, ‘MOTHER’S HAPPINESS IS PEOPLE’S HAPPINESS’, ‘FISH OUR WEALTH’. Why no one had torn them down I never understood.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The Moynaq canning factory was once a mainstay of the region’s economy. By 1986, ecological changes had taken their toll on the region and fish had to be shuttled in by desperate Soviet officials from thousands of miles away. Photo (cc) Martijn Munneke

Finally, we passed the canning factory, the city’s pride and one-time mainstay of the economy. We poked our noses through the chicken wire and saw inside a mess of rusted machinery and broken glass. The security guards shooed us away in sharp bursts of Karakalpak. But what were they protecting? The last native Aral fish had died in 1986, drowned by the noxious waves.

By 1986, 50 years of the Mengele school of ecology had taken their toll. New fish were shuttled in, but they too died. Moscow panicked. They had to keep the canners canning, whatever the cost. Fish caught in the Caspian and Baltic were hauled thousands of miles to remote Karakalpakstan just to keep the factory open. This was clearly unsustainable. Wild schemes were hatched to replenish the sea. One idea, the Sibaral Project, was as mad as it was expensive. The plan was to take the Ob and Irtysh, two massive Siberian rivers that flowed north into the Arctic, then dam, reverse and direct them south into the Aral Sea. If this were successful, cotton wealth could be enjoyed in perpetuity.

In Soviet times, wild schemes were hatched to replenish the sea. One idea was to reverse the Ob and Irtysh, two massive Siberian rivers that flowed north into the Arctic, and direct them south into the Aral Sea.

Orpheus was said to have piped so beautifully that he could change the direction of the River Styx. But by now the USSR could barely feed itself, let alone turn back nature. Even in the Forties, Viktor Vitkovich refers to the idea in his book. ‘If the plan goes ahead,’ he writes, ‘Central Asia would then have so much water that it could wipe the desert off the map for good.’ Thankfully, Siberia was spared this assault by massive popular criticism and lack of funds, so nothing was done. The canning factory closed, the fishermen hauled in their boats and the Aral Sea was sententiously proclaimed to be ‘Nature’s error’. When the damage was deemed irreversible the authorities cried, ‘Let it die a beautiful death.’

At last we arrived at the hotel. On the edge of the town, where the low buildings seemed to disappear into the scrub, stood a small, white-washed building decked in lush, trellised verdure. A tubby man in a string vest and flip-flops was splashing the greenery liberally with a hose. Heaven only knew where the water was coming from. He greeted us with a smile and led us through the lobby – walls stencilled with rowing boats and fish. Bohodir and I, both uncomfortable at this wanton display of plenty, walked up to the desk, where a pair of German travellers were waiting. They were in their mid-thirties, urban types with stylish haircuts and hemp bags. Anywhere else in the world we might have struck up a rapport, formed a temporary friendship built around our experiences. But not here. There was something each of us recognised in the other: a morbid curiosity in the disaster that was taking place. We confined ourselves to a nod.

As Bohodir and I were led upstairs, we peered from the staircase window to see a scrap-metal dump, a horizon of creeping scrub, and barefoot children making mud pies among the mess. The hotelier beckoned me to follow, loping around in his boxer shorts and vest. He was probably the richest man in Moynaq. Two or three guests a week and he was probably tied over until winter, when the place turned into a gulag.

Bohodir knocked at my door at eight.

‘You will need sunglasses, sunblock and a hat,’ he said.

I noticed he had none of the above, as we set off to the beach. The sun screamed down now and steppe winds were blowing sand in all directions.

‘Cover your eyes,’ called Bohodir, ‘don’t get the dust in your eyes.’ He was right. The yellowy soil wasn’t natural. It was infested with DDT and anthrax. We marched against the wind for a while, pushing against a flat and scrubby horizon. We weren’t far now. The sky was scraped an awesome blue by the scouring winds. A jogger panted past, with sweatbands and a visor. We stopped him, half to check if he was real, half to ask where the ‘ships’ graveyard’ was. The ships’ graveyard was the lodestar of Karakalpakstan, the point of visiting Moynaq: an eerie assemblage of beached boats on the dry seabed.

‘No more ships,’ he said, jogging on the spot. ‘They’ve taken them away. Don’t bother,’ and jogged off. I also wanted to ask him what he was doing exercising by a toxic seabed. It was like going to Chernobyl to ‘take the waters’, but he’d already vanished.

Soon, on the right, a finger of concrete appeared, an obelisk to the Karakalpak contribution to the Great Patriotic War.

And there in all its horrific majesty was the great Ok Kum, the White Sand Desert formerly known as the Aral Sea, a clumpy seabed that seemed to stretch forever. There were thickets and tough bushes that could probably survive in a post­-nuclear world. Here and there were scattered the detritus of a huge maritime industry, engine cast-offs, bolts and rowing boats like bath toys on the horizon.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The area that was once known as the Aral Sea is now called the Great Ok Kum Desert, Photo (cc) Martijn Munneke

We scrambled down the scree on to the dry bed to feel it under our feet. It felt hard and brown, pitching in small troughs, and disconcertingly moist underneath. Bohodir shoved a twig into a hard, glazed hummock. A gelatinous ooze slithered out like crème caramel.

It seemed the jogger was right, the tugs and trawlers really had been taken away. From where I stood, there were only the indentations of their hulls on the mud, as if some warm, full-bellied beasts had sloped off to die. I felt cheated of my prize. I stood on a bluff and looked into the distance. A shepherd was towing a line of cattle across the seabed. Their coats were matted and their udders deeply sagged. This toxic soil served as their daily pasture. I began to feel sick.

Far out of view, in the middle of the sea, was the island of Vozrozhdenie, or Resurrection. Karakalpaks had always been wary of it, and folklore claimed that an enchanted castle stood there, surrounded by flaming quicksand. They were half-right. The castle was a major Soviet bio-weapons plant called Aralsk 7, built in 1954 to study the dissemination patterns of biological weapons. Unluckily, the prevailing winds blew south to Karakalpakstan, carrying a cloud of toxins: anthrax, tularemia, brucellosis, plague, typhus and smallpox. The plant was abandoned in 1991, leaving the live anthrax spores to fester until in 2002, when the US Pentagon, fearing the use of this anthrax-laden soil by terrorists, sent the Threat Reduction Agency to decontaminate the anthrax dumps. Which they did, leaving the rest of the site untouched. Today any visit without full body protection would be tantamount to suicide.

As Bohodir and I eased out of Moynaq that afternoon, we spotted a man by the road. He had tattoos on his thin white arms. We offered him a lift as far as Qongirat. His name was Roger and he was an American Peace Corps worker. On the ride back he told us that he’d illegally put a group together to work with schoolchildren over the summer. President Karimov wanted NGOs as far away from Moynaq as possible, said Roger. He didn’t want foreigners to see how little was being done.

‘See,’ he told us in his deep Virginia drawl, ‘the official population here is nine thousand. But the real population is more like two. A lot of people think that Karimov is just watching and waiting for the last of the Karakalpaks to die off or disappear into Kazakhstan so it can then be repopulated by “ethnic” Uzbeks who will then make use of the mineral wealth lying under the ground. This is the rumour. But it doesn’t matter whether you believe it or not, because they’re already drilling for oil on the seabed. That wealth is not for Karakalpaks.’

Roger, a doctor by training, despite his unhealthy pallor, was a passionate activist. But there was something hard in his voice, a protective shell he’d developed after staying too long out here.

‘I don’t believe the republic will survive in the long run,’ he continued. ‘Perhaps another twenty, thirty years. They’re going already. They’ll go even quicker if HIV takes off. It’s a known fact that areas of high emigration, drugs, alcoholism and hepatitis like this are just waiting for an AIDS explosion. That should just about kill off whoever’s left.’

Roger got off at Qongirat without much of a goodbye and we carried on to Nukus. I tried to think what I’d gained by seeing all this. My desire to witness a dying society had been fulfilled. I’d observed the drawn-out suffering of a people without the resources to change their fate. Bohodir, who’d understood every word Roger had told us, sat watching the horizon without expression.

The midday heat had passed now, leaving the salt flats rippling to the horizon. The knots of telephone wires thinned into a line that pitched and fell by the side of the road, the plains opened and I stared, blankly, into the distance.

Few Karakalpaks I met – not even Bohodir, who was educated – showed any nostalgia for their historic nomadic days. That time was gone, and its significance lost. Today they mourned the Aral disaster and the losses that came in its wake – their livelihoods, pensions, factory jobs, farm jobs, office jobs, all of which vanished with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But I couldn’t help feeling sadness at the end of the nomadic way of life, and the loss of the deep understanding of the natural environment once possessed by the now-settled Turkic peoples. There was a wealth of ancestral knowledge that the steppe-dwelling peoples could have taught the USSR, but they were never given the chance. ‘Only by turning to their way of living can we make our way out of the bogs in which we vainly stumble,’ said Ella Maillart. But it was already too late. Today’s Karakalpaks watched the steppe as uncomprehendingly as I did.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Taken from ‘Out of Steppe’ by Daniel Metcalfe. Published by Arrow at £8.99. Copyright © Daniel Metcalfe 2009. http://www.rbooks.co.uk/product.aspx?id=0099524996

When Mikhail Gorbachev introduced the policy of Glasnost across all Soviet government institutions in the late 1980s, it marked the beginning of the end for the Soviet Empire. What the policy meant was that for the first time, the press would be able to disseminate uncensored information without fear of reprisal.  The details of Stalin’s purges could be published for the first time; the previously hidden detail of endemic social problems could be printed in newspapers; and debates could be had and ideas shared with the Western world – legally. Gorbachev had pulled back the Iron Curtain and, if only momentarily, the Soviet Empire got its first authorised glimpse of democracy.

But 19 years have passed since the end of Gorbachev’s short tenure as President of the Soviet Union, and unfortunately the spirit of Glasnost does not live on. Today it is estimated that nearly 80 per cent of those living in the former Soviet Union still live under authoritarian regimes that deprive them of fundamental political rights and civil liberties. Tightly controlled news media, pliant courts and brutal security forces are prevalent characteristics. The last ten years in particular, according to an extensive survey by Freedom House, have constituted “a decade of democratic regression in the former Soviet Union”.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Nowhere is this more apparent than within the borders of Kazakhstan – where dissenters, journalists and human rights activists have been frequently and consistently repressed with zeal. Nursultan Nazarbayev, Kazakhstan’s 70-year old president, is one of only two leaders in the former USSR who also held power during the days of communist rule.  Nazarbayev presents himself as a man of democracy, often asserting his commitment to the “protection and promotion of human rights and fundamental freedoms”. In reality, however, he is a dictator committed more so than anything else to the protection and maintenance of his own power.

Glasnost, therefore, is far from the agenda in Kazakhstan. According to Human Rights Watch, independent journalists who criticize Nazarbayev’s government face threats, harassment and “antiquated” penalties for civil defamation and libel. This year alone, no fewer than two independent newspapers have been shut under Kazakh government pressure, while examples of press repression are reported almost weekly by Almaty-based media monitoring group Adil Soz, reflecting the country’s position as 162 out of 178 in Reporters Without Borders’ Press Freedom Index.

One newspaper in particular, Respublika, has faced repeated and well-documented harassment from the Kazakh government.  In 2002, after having supported an oppositional political party (Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan), reporters from Respublika turned up to work to find the corpse of a decapitated dog outside their offices. Next to the dog was a note that read, simply, “This is the last warning”. The following day, their offices were burned down.

But Republika refused to be intimidated and continued to publish, often under a different name in order to evade the authorities. Banned from the printing presses, and faced with a $400,000 fine in 2009 for publishing an opinion piece critical of the government owned bank BTA, the paper is now self-published by dedicated staff using office equipment, maintaining a circulation of 19,000. They have also adopted social media such as Facebook and Twitter to get their stories out.  But their website, which once reached approximately 33,000 people per week (a substantial figure given that approximately only 34.3% of Kazakhstanis have access to the internet), has been blocked internally by the government.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Kazakhstan's new capital Astana will show OSCE
leaders its glitz and glamour. 

“We had a high readership and people were discussing things, sharing ideas and trying to take action…that was the reason they blocked us,” said Respublika reporter Yevgeniya Plakhina.  “If our government doesn’t like the content, they just block it."

Despite continuing to employ such draconian censorship measures, Kazakhstan has over the course of 2010 chaired the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) – a 56 member intergovernmental organisation whose mandate includes a major commitment to “addressing and providing early warning on violations of freedom of expression.”

“It’s beyond ironic,” said Rachel Denber, acting Executive Director of Human Rights Watch’s Europe and Central Asia Division. “I think that there were real questions about Kazakhstan’s suitability as the chair of the organisation because of its deeply flawed human rights record. No country is perfect, but Kazakhstan really needed to do more before it had the chairmanship.”

It was felt by some, though, that giving Kazakhstan the opportunity to chair the OSCE would force the government to push through reforms. This was undoubtedly based upon a willingness to give the country’s leadership the benefit of the doubt. After all, when Kazakhstan made its initial bid for the chairmanship in 2007, then Foreign Minister Marat Tazhin had pledged at the OSCE Ministerial Council in Madrid that Kazakhstan would bring its media laws up to international standards. “We are going to incorporate various proposals into a consolidated bill to amend the Media Law,” he said at the time. Yet three years on, the pledge rings hollow.

“Tazhin promised in Madrid that we would stick to democratic laws,” said Plakhina. “But when Kazakhstan was chosen to chair the OSCE nothing actually changed. It got even worse… several newspapers were closed as a result of defamation lawsuits.”

Part of the problem, Plakhina believes, is Kazakhstan’s geographical location. The country is a corridor to Afghanistan and a key ally of coalition forces in the War on Terror. It is also home to the Caspian Sea, which contains oil estimated to be worth in the region of $12 trillion.

“We have oil, we have gas, we have other resources,” Plakhina says. “I think our rights and freedoms are traded for resources, traded for other political advantages that OSCE member countries are taking from us.  Few of the OSCE members criticise Kazakhstan. That’s what really disappoints me.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

70-year-old president Nursultan Nazarbayev, who has
led the country since before independence in 1991.

Later this week, Kazakhstan will end its one year term as chair of the OSCE by hosting the annual OSCE summit, on December 1 and 2.  International security is set to form the dominant part of the programme, but human rights and media freedom issues will also feature. Human Rights Watch will present a statement at the summit that will “urge the OSCE to prevail on participating states to uphold their commitments to freedom of expression across the board,” and the British delegation – led by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg – will also raise human rights concerns.

“We continue to be concerned about freedoms of religion, expression, assembly and of the media [in Kazakhstan],” said a spokesperson for the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, who also praised the country for taking steps with its reform agenda. “We and international partners will continue to encourage the Kazakh authorities  both bilaterally and through key international organisations such as the EU and OSCE, to press ahead with reforms, many of which they themselves have identified as necessary."

 This will offer little reassurance for Plakhina and her colleagues at Respublika, though. For them there remains a sense of anxiety about what will happen when Kazakhstan steps back from the international scrutiny inevitably attached to the chairmanship of the OSCE. The newspaper, for instance, recently received an anonymous email informing them that after the summit they would be closed down once and for all.

“After the summit you will hear about a lot of bad things going on in Kazakhstan,“ Plakhina says. “We won’t any longer have to hide our human rights violations… things are going to take a turn for the worse. We are trying to increase awareness in European countries about what is going to happen, but there is not much hope. As long as Nazarbayev is president, nothing is going to change.”

What lessons can we learn from the presidential election recently held in Turkmenistan? Apparently none if we focus on the domestic implications, with Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov re-elected as president with a landslide 97% of the vote. The Berdymuhamedov regime has now completed the process of consolidating its power; it can now be expected to focus on re-personalising Turkmen politics, filling the void left after the death of long-time dictator Saparmurat Niyazov in 2006. Certainly the campaign to create a cult of Berdymuhamedov’s personality is well under way.

Analysing Berdymuhamedov’s re-election from a regional perspective stimulates some interesting questions about the current trajectory of Central Asia’s post-Soviet political evolution. The vote of 12 February made a mockery of the institution of elections and this is a trend that has characterised Central Asian politics in recent years. Two of the three recent presidential elections in the region – Turkmenistan’s in February and Kazakhstan’s snap election held in April 2011 – have seen incumbents re-elected as a result of machinations from within the ruling regimes rather than an expression of popular will. In both cases there has been a high degree of regime interference in the electoral campaigns and many irregularities in the voting procedures.

On the other hand, the third electoral contest held in Central Asia in the last 12 months – in Kyrgyzstan in October 2011 – constituted the first smooth presidential transition to have ever occurred in Central Asia since the collapse of the Soviet Union. In an unprecedented decision, Roza Otunbaeva decided not to run for the presidential post, opening the field to ‘fresh’ candidates.

In the context of the transmission of power according to constitutional provisions, the Turkmen election represents an interesting element in Central Asian developments – obviously, for all the wrong reasons. The Turkmen vote constitutes yet another episode in the peculiar intersection between elections and authoritarianism that has so profoundly characterised the politics of Central Asia in the last 20 years. It crystallises authoritarianism as the rule to which Central Asian governance seems to conform. Finally, it consolidates the regional praxis that supports the hegemony of incumbent leaders.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Men on a mission. Presidents (L-R) Nursultan Nazarbaev of Kazakhstan, Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov of Turkmenistan and Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan all appear to be pursuing lifelong reigns. None has a succession plan in place.

This latter point represents a critical element in the politics of Central Asia – one that in turn raises questions about the future stability of the region. As a rule, Central Asian leaders pursue monopolistic power and tend to stay in power for long periods of time. These factors underpin the political experience of the last two decades, during which regimes have failed to put in place practices for succession.

To date, three out of the five Central Asian states have experienced top-level leadership change since the achievement of independence. Turkmenistan’s power transition of 2006-2007 was initiated by the natural death of Niyazov, which set into motion a process of intra-elite struggle that ultimately saw Berdymuhamedov as its victor. Transitions in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan were somewhat more traumatic. While a civil war led to the accession to absolute power of Emomali Rahmon (Tajikistan), popular unrest was behind the fall of the two successive Kyrgyz regimes, headed by Askar Akaev (2005) and Kurmanbek Bakiev (2010). In this sense, the election of Almazbek Atambaev to the Presidency of the Kyrgyz Republic is Central Asia’s only power transition occurred in adherence to constitutional dictates. The recent Kyrgyz case is therefore the exception to the norm: elsewhere the transfer of power has been determined by overt or covert competition amongst members of the regime, relatively violent episodes of popular unrest and even direct military hostilities.

If leadership change is an indicator of regime insecurity, then Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are Central Asia’s most stable political systems: Nursultan Nazarbaev and Islam Karimov have retained power ever since 1991. Similarly Tajikistan’s president appears to be in a relatively stable position: Rahmon has been in office since 1994, while he was Prime Minister from 1992 to 94. While it is too early to make any assessment of the nature of Atambaev’s regime in Kyrgyzstan, the Turkmen election has confirmed Berdymuhamedov’s plans to establish long-term rule, continuing Niyazov’s way.

'Central Asia’s cultural tendency towards dynasticism appears to be secondary to the personalism that characterises post-Soviet power in the region.'

Interestingly, none of Central Asia’s current leaders has made plans for succession. While this understandable for the relatively young Berdymuhamedov (b.1957) and Rahmon (b.1952), it is puzzling that the older leaders – Nazarbaev (b.1940) and Karimov (b.1938) – have chosen not to publicly endorse a successor. Here Central Asia’s cultural tendency towards dynasticism appears to be secondary to the personalism that characterises post-Soviet power in the region. Paradoxicallly, therefore, in this sense the Kazakh and Uzbek regimes look perhaps the least durable, as it is not clear that they will outlast their current leader.

Indeed, Central Asian leaders appear to overstep the mark in terms of wielding power, monopolising it to an extent that militates against nurturing successors. This was certainly the case in pre-2006 Turkmenistan, where Niyazov’s options for intra-elite succession were reduced by the President’s paranoid distrust of his political associates, while dynastic succession was limited by his estrangement from his own family.

Similarly, dynasticism appears not to be an option for Nazarbaev and Karimov, as both leaders do not have a direct male heir in their current family ranks (although Karimov has a son from his first marriage). Although the presidents’ daughters – Dariga, Dinara and Aliya Nazarbaeva; Gulnara and Lola Karimova – are recognisable figures in their countries (yet not necessarily popular), it seems unlikely that they could become frontrunners in a top-level power transition. If Gulnara Karimova was once thought to be in a privileged position to succeed to her father, her chances have significantly decreased after 2010, when questions surrounding her business interests circulated.

Meanwhile succession based on family ties has been widely anticipated in Kazakhstan. At different times, Rakhat Aliyev – Dariga’s ex-husband – and Timur Kulibaev – Dinara’s current spouse – were presented by Kazakhstan-watchers as Nursultan Nazarbaev’s potential heirs. Interestingly, they have both now fallen out of favour with Nazarbaev: while former Deputy Foreign Minister Aliyev has now become a staunch (and very vocal) opponent to his former father-in-law, Kulibaev was recently dismissed from his post as head of Samruk-Qazyn, Kazakhstan’s Sovereign Fund.

In spite of their reluctance to nominate a successor, both Nazarbaev and Karimov have begun to deal more publicly with the limitations that age is inevitably imposing on their power. In an official visit to Germany in early February 2012, Nazarbaev answered several questions from German journalists about the state of his health. The president’s openness on the subject contrasts with his government’s reticence over rumours of prostatic surgery Nazarbaev reportedly underwent in July 2011.

Karimov, on the other hand, dealt indirectly but publicly with his own mortality in a major parliamentary speech in December 2010, when he outlined a new succession procedure to be applied in the event of his death of incapacitation. Presidential concerns with age are also thought to underpin the recent (December 2011) decision to shorten the Uzbek presidential term from seven to five years. This decision may bring about a presidential election as early as this year. Some observers have commented that the aim of the current, shorter term may be to identify a successor – current Prime Minister Shavkat Mirziyaev appears to be the front runner – and negotiate an exit strategy, ensuring that Karimov and his family can step away without fear of violent or punative retribution. Another possible explanation for the shorter term is that it could simply be another subterfuge, aimed at prolonging his time at the helm.

Whatever decision Karimov reaches on the scope of his next mandate and whatever course Nazarbaev’s health takes, political succession in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan is no longer a matter for another day: it now represents the impending reality of a not-so-distant future. The stability of the two major political systems therefore appears at risk, as neither leadership has made arrangements to face the tasks posed by the departure of long-term leaders. If Nazarbaev and Karimov do not reverse this trend by placing the issue of succession at the centre of their remaining time in power, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan will find themselves immersed in the same uncertainty that surrounded Turkmenistan following the death of Niyazov.

Although pre-arranged succession measures do not guarantee regime security against the emergence of instability, the Central Asian experience tells us that the lack of succession arrangements can result either in widespread instability or in the perpetuation of authoritarian practices, a situation that ultimately puts the local population between a rock and a hard place. This is exactly the scenario the citizens of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan want to avoid when their leaders exit the stage.

Over most of the past twenty years Kazakhstan has been a beacon of peace and security in Central Asia. Recently, however, internal unease and unrest appear to have increased. Several incidents are symptomatic of the situation:

--   On 16th December last year, security forces fired on unarmed striking oil workers and other people in the western city of Zhanaozen, killing and wounding a large number. The workers had been on strike for nearly eight months.

--   On 18th April, after a trial behind closed doors, forty-seven men were sentenced to prison terms for alleged terrorism in the western city of Atyrau.

--   On 19th April, a courageous independent journalist in western Kazakhstan, Lukpan Akhmedyarov, was stabbed and shot with a pneumatic pistol. He had gained prominence for reporting on abuses of government power. On 27th , despite being seriously wounded, Akhmedyarov was put on trial for allegedly "wounding the dignity and honour" of an provincial official.

'These incidents suggest that politics and governance in Kazakhstan are fraying at the edges. The legitimacy of the current political system and leadership may be ebbing. Political life is insufficiently open and resilient to absorb conflicting pressures.'

--   On 28th May, fourteen border guards and a park ranger were killed at a remote outpost on the Kazakhstani-Chinese border. Officials charged a private in the border guard for the crime, although it looked more like the work of a well-armed gang than a single soldier. Suspicion that the private had been framed was heightened when a television newscaster resigned rather than report his alleged confession.

--   On 29th May, gold miners were given a 30-35% pay increase on the first day of a strike.  Earlier in May, copper workers won a rise of 100% after striking for two days. These settlements suggest that the authorities fear another extended or bitter strike, such as that in Zhanaozen. Undue wage concessions, however, could lead to overblown demands elsewhere.

--   On 30th May, Kazakhstan's leadership lashed out at the social media for ‘spreading lies and propagating violence and evil’.

--   On 4th June, thirty-three people were convicted of inciting mass disorder in Zhanaozen last December, and thirteen were sentenced to prison. Many fewer police have been convicted of crimes related to tragic events of 16th December,  even though they were the ones doing the shooting.

'Frustrations seem to be greatest in western Kazakhstan. People there may expect a greater share of the benefits from the dynamic pace of energy development in their region.'

--  On 5th June, an activist who defended the rights of coal miners and oil workers in Zhanaozen was found dead in his apartment.

--   On 15th June, in Almaty, the authorities arrested an internationally respected theatre director on charges of ‘inciting social hatred’. The director, Bolat Atabayev, had put on a play in March that made allusions to the Zhanaozen tragedy and official repression.

What do these incidents say about Kazakhstan?

Taken together, these incidents suggest that politics and governance in Kazakhstan are fraying at the edges. The legitimacy of the current political system and leadership may be ebbing. Political life is insufficiently open and resilient to absorb conflicting pressures. There are too few checks and balances to monitor and properly restrain executive power.

Frustrations seem to be greatest in western Kazakhstan.  People there may expect a greater share of the benefits from the dynamic pace of energy development in their region. Differences between actual and expected improvements in living standards might be increasing faster there than elsewhere in Kazakhstan.

The problem in this region seems to be symptomatic of a wider challenge for Kazakhstan – an increasing gap between economic and political progress.  This gap may be fermenting popular anxieties and unrest, and eroding social strengths such as interethnic harmony. 

'Two [comparators] have made more combined political and economic progress than Kazakhstan: Slovenia and Bulgaria.  Both belong to the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Two countries have made less progress: Ukraine and Uzbekistan.'

Published rankings by independent organizations, and statistics for per capita income, make possible quantitative comparisons that shed some light on the scale of Kazakhstan's democracy gap.

On the basis of these I have made a comparison between five European and Eurasian countries formerly under communist rule -- Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Slovenia, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. Rankings are shown for three indices of political progress and three of economic progress (see appendix below for details).

The comparators were chosen for illustrative purposes; they are not a scientific sample. Two have made more combined political and economic progress than Kazakhstan: Slovenia and Bulgaria. Both belong to the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Two countries have made less progress: Ukraine and Uzbekistan. 

Several conclusions may be drawn from these data.

First, two countries – Slovenia and Bulgaria -- have made the most democratic progress, and their economic progress correlates roughly with this.

Second, despite having benefitted from the popular Orange Revolution and several fair elections and peaceful transfers of power, Ukraine has made scarcely more democratic progress than Kazakhstan, mainly because of its high level of corruption.  On the economic side, Ukraine is held back by its low per capita income. As a consequence of these factors, Kazakhstan has made more overall progress than Ukraine, an aspirant to membership in the European Union.

Third, although Uzbekistan, the most populous Central Asian state, was once widely considered to be the most important player in Central Asia and a natural leader, the absence of significant political and economic reforms has left it weakened. Kazakhstan has overtaken Uzbekistan as the major power in Central Asia.  

Fourth, although Kazakhstan has made strong economic gains (it trails only Slovenia among the comparators), it has made less progress towards democracy. This imbalance may help explain why internal unease seems to be growing. The rising expectations of increasingly prosperous and educated Kazakhstanis for more participation in political life are not being met.

The lack of balance in Kazakhstan’s economic and political progress may lead to more serious tensions in the future, and a higher risk of unstable political transitions.  The issue is not whether reforms meet with Western approbation, but whether they satisfy the growing aspirations of Kazakhstanis. The problem is not that democratic reforms are too rapid, but that they are too modest.

Appendix

Comparative Political and Economic Indices for Kazakhstan

Rankings are shown by raw score, and normalized as a percentage of 100. The latter are in brackets.

1. Political Indices

1.  Transparency International, Corruption Perceptions Index 2011.  Ranks countries and territories according to their perceived levels of public sector corruption.  183 countries.  Slovenia, 35 (19); Bulgaria, 86 (47); Kazakhstan, 120 (63); Ukraine, 152 (80); Uzbekistan, 177 (94).

2.  Vision of Humanity, Global Peace Index 2012.  Ranks countries by their absence of violence, using metrics that combine both internal and external factors.  158 countries.  Slovenia, 8(5); Bulgaria, 40 (25); Ukraine, 72 (46); Kazakhstan, 106 (67); Uzbekistan, 111 (70).

3.  Foreign Policy and Fund for Peace, Failed States 2012.  Ranks countries according to indices of state failure.  177 countries. Slovenia, 16 (9); Bulgaria, 47 (27); Ukraine, 64 (36); Kazakhstan, 70 (40); Uzbekistan, 138 (78).

2. Economic Indices

World Economic Forum, Global Competitiveness Index 2011-12. Measures business operating environments and competitiveness. 142 countries.  Slovenia, 57 (40); Kazakhstan, 72 (51); Bulgaria, 74 (52); Ukraine, 82 (58); Uzbekistan, not ranked.

2. World Bank, Doing Business 2012: Doing Business in a More Transparent World.  Assesses regulations affecting domestic firms and ranks economies on business regulation, using such indices as starting a business, resolving insolvency and trading across borders.   183 countries.  Slovenia, 37 (20); Kazakhstan, 47 (26); Bulgaria, 59 (32); Ukraine, 152 (83); Uzbekistan, 166 (91).

3. World Bank, Gross National Income Per Capita 2011, Atlas Method.  215 countries. Slovenia ($23,860), 47 (22); Kazakhstan ($7,440), 90 (42); Bulgaria ($6,240),97 (45); Ukraine ($3,010), 135 (63); Uzbekistan ($1,280), 163 (76).

Averages of Indices Using Normalized Values

                     Political    Economic      Combined

                                         Average

Slovenia             11             27              19

Bulgaria             33             43              38

Kazakhstan        57             40              48

Ukraine              54             68              61

Uzbekistan         81             84              82

Kazakhstan’s resource-fuelled economic boom and thriving market economy have turned it into the economic powerhouse of Central Asia, setting it even farther apart from the poorer, less developed and reform-resistant economies of the region. Now the second most dynamic economy in the post-Soviet space after Russia, its Gross Domestic Product ($186.27 billion in 2011) is three times the combined GDP of neighbouring Uzbekistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Tajikistan.[1]

Rising economic growth and prosperity have transformed Kazakhstan from an emigration country of the 1990s to a flourishing migrant-receiving state. The void left by the departure of 1.8 million Russians-speakers in its first decade of independence is being filled by the return of ethnic Kazakh diaspora (referred to as oralman) under the state-sponsored repatriation programme.

'Rising economic growth and prosperity have transformed Kazakhstan from an emigration country of the 1990s to a flourishing migrant-receiving state.'

By 2010 about 800,000 had relocated to Kazakhstan, placing Kazakhstan among top ten migrant-receiving states.  But what is less known abroad and little discussed within Kazakhstan is the fact that, after Russia, it is the next regular destination for earning livelihoods, albeit without a legal work permit or a formal status, for a growing number of Central Asians.

Legal status and jobs

Migrant workers from other states of Central Asia remain uncounted and invisible to the state authorities due to the lack of an appropriate legal framework and labour policies, which dooms them to an ‘illegal’ or ‘irregular’ status. These are Kazakhstan’s ‘gastarbaitery’ (the Russianized plural of German Gastarbeiter), a term that is widely used to designate the sizable pool of unskilled or semi-skilled foreign migrant workers from Central Asia. Though no longer widely used in Germany, the term has arrived through the Russian media into Kazakhstan along with its negative baggage and racial stereotype.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Despite the lower wages, many migrant workers from Central Asia choose Kazakhstan to look for jobs. It is closer to their home countries, and it is easier for them to adapt to local cultural norms and values (photo: Fergana News Agency, all rights reserved)

In the absence of reliable government statistics, the International Organization of Migration (IOM) estimated that in 2010 migrant workers in Kazakhstan number from 500,000 to a million people, with almost two thirds of them from Uzbekistan, some 25% from Kyrgyzstan and the rest from Tajikistan and other CIS states. Others suggest that the number of foreign workers in Kazakhstan is likely to reach 3 million within the next years and only 200,000-300,000 of these are likely to be working legally.

At least half of them work in construction, performing what are considered 3-D jobs (‘dirty, dangerous, and degrading’) shunned by the locals. Several others work in the expanding service sector – catering, transportation, delivery, retail and sales; and the remaining work as seasonal labourers in agriculture – in tobacco, cotton fields, foodstuff packing and processing.

'Migrant workers from other states of Central Asia remain uncounted and invisible to the state authorities due to the lack of an appropriate legal framework and labour policies, which dooms them to an ‘illegal’ or ‘irregular’ status.'

The ready availability of cheap semi-skilled and short-term migrant labour is contributing significantly to spurring rapid growth in construction and service sectors in the prominent cities Astana, Almaty, Shymkent, Atyrau, and Aktau. However, no authoritative official data, statistics or studies on the role of migrant workers in the labour force or in the informal economy exist. It is becoming increasingly apparent that although the state authorities continue to combat ‘illegal’ migration, regarding it as a security threat or as promoting criminal activities, they covertly allow the influential recruiters or employers to hire the gastarbaitery.

Cultural affinity, legal barriers

How do these ‘guest-workers’ find work, negotiate the risks involved and find a niche for themselves in Kazakhstan? With its widespread reputation for ethnic stability and tolerance, Kazakhstan is seen as a more hospitable place than Russia for fellow Central Asian migrants, particularly the young, first time migrants. For Bakhtiyor and Raushan, two young Uzbek men in their early 20s from Fergana, Kazakhstan’s new capital, Astana, is modern, vibrant,  easy to get around and full of opportunities. They left home for the first time to look for work for in construction so that they could earn money for their own marriages and those of their sisters.

For more experienced migrant workers such as Babamurad and several of his extended kin who were working together as a 26-men construction brigade, the pay in Kazakhstan is lower than in Russia but its proximity makes it more convenient. All are ethnic Tajiks from the same mahalla in Bukhara, hired by a sub-contractor through their connections in Russia to build a mosque in Karaganda and cottages for Astana’s wealthy. Several of them have been working in various cities in Russia over the past 7 years, where‘work is plentiful, but so are the racists and skinheads.’ The absence of overt racism and the relative ease of forming connections with the locals on the basis of shared Islamic practices and linguistic affinity are appealing to the initiates as well as to the veteran migrants.

Notwithstanding these positives and its assiduously cultivated image as a peaceful and tolerant multiethnic state with a long tradition of hospitality, Kazakhstan is neither a migrant-welcoming nor a migrant-seeking state. The term ‘migrant’ or ‘migration’, as used in law, official statements and media reports refers to ethnic Kazakh returnees - oralman - and to the internal rural migrants to the major cities. Even the oralman, who are assured of Kazakhstani citizenship and settlement assistance, face innumerable problems in negotiating the legal-institutional and bureaucratic obstacles in formalizing their status.

While the ruling establishment, policy experts and academics pay scant attention to the growing number of labour migrants, the urban residents as well as the media tend to lump together all categories of migrants: the oralman who don’t speak Russian well, the migrants from rural areas living in the city without registration (propiska), and the gastarbeitery, clustered around construction sites or bazaars.

'With its widespread reputation for ethnic stability and tolerance, Kazakhstan is seen as a more hospitable place than Russia for fellow Central Asian migrants, particularly the young, first time migrants.'

But unlike the oralman and the internal migrants, who at least have formal legal rights and entitlements as citizens, the Central Asian migrant workers lack a legal status, rights or social protection which renders them most vulnerable to exploitation, extortion by officials, arbitrary fines and deportations. Here’s how an article in a local media describes them, with the aim of highlighting their vulnerability:

‘Gastarbaiter - an ill-shaven person with a pale look, and smell of cheap deodorant. [This] labour migrant is shabbily-dressed with a scared look. He’s afraid of everything: cold, police, dark streets on which well-fed lads walk with hands tucked in their pockets, ever-so watchful babushki [Rn. grannies] in the bazaars who suspect a thief or a terrorist in the face of a foreign nationality. He’s vulnerable from all corners because he has no rights, is cut off from his homeland and doesn’t know the laws of a foreign land.’

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Modern architecture in Astana, the new capital of Kazakhstan, is the best evidence of the country’s economic boom. The local construction industry there relies heavily on the migrant work force (photo: www.flickr.com, peretzp's photostream).

In contrast to the juridical category of Gastarbeiter in Germany, who were brought in legally as contract workers for a fixed term and offered legal and economic protection, these migrants have no job contract or work permit. The typical Turkish Gastarbeiter, on the other hand, was alone, facing socio-cultural isolation and lacking any proficiency in German, whereas most migrants from the near abroad either have some personal connections or quickly form these, and are able to mingle with the locals on the basis of cultural-linguistic and religious affinity.

The migrants who agreed to meet me were evidently those who had networks or‘friends’, and thus more protected than the vast majority of the more vulnerable migrants who work in near complete isolation from the locals, shun any contact with strangers and strive to remain invisible to the state. They acknowledged the help and goodwill extended by the locals – be it the employer, intermediary or a business partner – and mentioned how they together had to find ways of dealing with the stringent regulations preventing them from working and avoid the gaze of the police and officials.

Legal and bureaucratic hurdles

Kazakhstan adopted a new Migration Law in August 2011, after considerable delay but without adequate public discussion. It identifies three key directions and objectives of migration: 1] facilitating repatriation, settlement, and integration of the oralman, denoting an ethno-national vision; 2] maintenance of national security and prevention of illegal migration, reflecting a ‘securitization’ perspective; 3] management of internal migratory processes from rural to urban areas, particularly resettlement of citizens residing in ecologically depressed regions to other regions, which addresses issues of social welfare and equal distribution. The law also contains quota provisions for highly-skilled foreign workers. But the quota set is miniscule: it was set at 66,300 in 2009, then reduced by a third in 2011; it avoids any reference to the shortages in various other sectors; and the mechanisms and implementation remain deficient.

The law is also silent about the status of the CIS labour migrants who enter the country legally under the visa-free regime, indicating the purpose of their visit as ‘personal’ on the migration card when evidently looking for paid work for the duration of their stay. Such migrants are required to register within 5 days, may remain only for the authorized period of stay (reduced from 90 to 30 days after political instability in Kyrgyzstan in April 2010) and cannot work.

The apparently simple task of visiting the local Migration Department, filling out the registration form and supplying the address of a temporary residence with the name of the property owner may take a few hours or a few days. Most migrants are deterred from going in person to register by the fear that the authorities will deliberately look for mistakes on the form, demand further documents, question them about their intent to visit Kazakhstan or use the information they provide to monitor them. They often fail to grant the registration within the time limit so that they can demand bribes. ‘It is much easier to pay the required 3000-5000 tenge ($20-$33) to an intermediary or a friend than to spend the precious work time in the queue and to risk not being able to register in time,’ said a migrant from Bishkek, highlighting what is a widespread practice.

'The migrants working in the bazaars as traders, shopkeepers, in catering or cleaning jobs tend to be protected by their employers.'

The migrants working in the bazaars as traders, shopkeepers, in catering or cleaning jobs tend to be protected by their employers. A majority of those working in the multiethnic mosaic of Kazakhstan’s bazaars are of non-Kazakh nationality. Alia, an oralman who came to Almaty from Tashkent in the late 1990s, sells tea and pirozhki [Rn. pies] in Almaty’s barakholka [Rn. flea market] bazaar. She agreed to be my interlocutor and introduced me to other migrants.

I asked her why other nationalities and migrants, and not Kazakhs, are so visible. Her response: ‘Of course all these stalls are owned by Kazakhs [Kazakhstani citizens] who rent them out to others. Legally, only a Kazakhstani national may own the stalls and work there. So all those [migrants] selling goods are neither the official owners nor employees. And virtually all the police, migration officials, those in charge of migrants’ registration, tax collection, health and safety inspection, compliance with hygiene and sanitary standards, and those organizing raids and checks are Kazakhs.’

Typically, the legal owner of a stall in the bazaar, who can only be a Kazakhstani national or permanent resident, leases it to migrants or non-citizens. He or she arranges registration and other relevant documentation for a set fee of 3000-5000 tenge (depending on citizenship and other factors), helps with obtaining housing and offers overall protection from the police.

Gulnara, whose husband is a policeman, owns three retail outlets in the barakholka. One is leased to a Kyrgyz woman who, together with members of her extended family (shuttling back and forth between Almaty and Bishkek to manage their legal status), sells garments made in Bishkek. Her husband drives a ‘taxi’ between Almaty and Bishkek and also carries passports of fellow Kyrgyz migrants to secure a new migration card. The other two are leased to Kyrgyz and Uzbek migrants selling fruit and vegetables. Gulnara is a ‘fixer’ who recognises that her business interests and the well-being of migrants are interlinked: she also ran a marriage agency that helped migrants to obtain citizenship or residency in Kazakhstan through marriage.

Alisher, an Uzbek from Andijan, is a contractor with permanent residency in Kazakhstan (through marriage to a Kazakhstani citizen) and has opted to retain his Uzbek passport. He frequently travels to Andijan to recruit construction workers. ‘These are my family,’ he said as he introduced me to the young Uzbek men on the construction site. ‘Are there no Kazakh workers?’ I asked him. He laughed and said, ‘Kazakhs don’t know how to work!’ Connections with the police enable him to bring workers from Uzbekistan and protect them. ‘Work keeps them away from Islam and narcotics,’ he averred.

Avoiding ‘illegality’

Kazakhstan’s Migration Law defines an ‘illegal migrant’ simply as a person who has ‘violated the laws of the Republic of Kazakhstan pertaining to migration,’ offering no further elaboration. Migrants are routinely charged for violating terms of stay under Article 394, Part 1 of the Code ‘On Violations by foreign citizens or stateless people of rules of stay in Kazakhstan’ and deported for repeated violations under Part II of the same code. They negotiate the one-month limit by leaving the country to re-enter on a new migration card with a new one-month permit.

'An entire informal industry of acquiring documentation has emerged: train conductors facilitate the acquisition of new migration cards for those who have overstayed their authorised term, bus and taxi drivers or other intermediaries carry documents back and forth with the necessary stamp or to facilitate the safe passage home of a person who has overstayed his registration period.'  

Sharof, from Tajikistan, goes to Bishkek every month together with many Kyrgyz in order to obtain a new entry stamp. Many now find it is easier and cheaper to pay someone to take their passport to the border for a new entry stamp. An entire informal industry of acquiring documentation has emerged: train conductors facilitate the acquisition of new migration cards for those who have overstayed their authorised term, bus and taxi drivers or other intermediaries carry documents back and forth with the necessary stamp or to facilitate the safe passage home of a person who has overstayed his registration period.

Many simply overstay – the construction job needs to be completed in order to collect the payment, the documents are in possession of the employer or middlemen, they may lose their job and pay for the work completed so far if they leave. Migrants who overstay can now pay an ‘administrative fine’ of about 15,000 tenge ($100), giving them a 12 day grace period within which to leave the country. Failing this, a deportation order is issued. Some choose to pay the fine in order to maximise the term of their stay and enjoy some provisional immunity from deportation. Others simply risk it in the hope of reaching a‘settlement’ at the border.

The Department of Migration Police organises frequent inspections and raids to track down ‘illegal’ migrants and releases the data to the press. Anuar, a Dungan from Bishkek noted, ‘We know very well that they are given orders from above, need to impress their superiors on how well they’re doing their job, and that they need to earn extra money,’ adding ‘they especially come before festival times or some big event such as this summit [reference to the OSCE summit in Astana in December 2010], when they deported some 500 from the bazaars. But they weren’t really deported– just sent to Karaganda for the weekend – and all came back the next week.’

Rasul, a Tajik migrant who has now regularised his status by marrying a Kazakh, reported how raids are carried out: ‘They either come as a band when an official raid is organised or come in a group of two to four to inspect..…they always target the most vulnerable ones. those who are ignorant, inexperienced or simply not very smart.’

What next?

Almost all the people I interviewed in Almaty and Astana claimed that their documents were ‘in order.’ Further conversations revealed that virtually everyone had procured an official status through ‘friends’, intermediaries or employers by paying a fee or making other informal deals. These reveal how a complex web of personal connections, strategies and informal arrangements enable the migrants to acquire the relevant documentation to maintain their status as a ‘visitor’ and keep their real status invisible to the law. Every lacuna in the law, as well as every restriction imposed by the law, is dealt with by relying on informal connections and personal networks and resorting to quasi-legal practices.

'Migrants have a very clear understanding of their niche in the labour market and the jobs that Kazakhstani citizens are unwilling or unable to perform.' 

The state remains trapped in a self-limiting discourse within the framework of ethno-nationalism and the ‘securitization’ of cross border mobility. This prevents it from addressing the complexities of a rapidly growing economy and adopting appropriate labour and migration policies. The likely result will be the further erosion of its ability to regulate or manage migration flows and the informal labour market. In this way the state has covertly opted to let migrant workers remain invisible and illegible while utilizing the ‘cheap’ labour they provide. To acknowledge the scale of undocumented or informal labour migration would require an obligation to enact appropriate legislation and regulatory measures.

Migrants have a very clear understanding of their niche in the labour market and the jobs that Kazakhstani citizens are unwilling or unable to perform. ‘There’s so much yet to build, so much work to finish…if only they let us stay for 6 months rather than making us go here and there,’…. ‘who will feed the Astanites if we don’t work here.…?’ is what some of the Uzbeks working in Astana said.

As urban Kazakhstani citizens increasingly rely on the migrants to perform so many of their housekeeping functions, it may not be too soon to conclude that many of them will establish at least a temporary abode for themselves in Kazakhstan and subvert the very notion of being gastarbaitery.

------------------------------------------

[1] The GDP for 2011 for Tajikistan was $6.52 billion, Uzbekistan $45.36 billion, and Kyrgyzstan $6.4 billion. Migrant remittances constitute 48% of Tajikistan’s GDP, at least a third of Kyrgyzstan’s GDP and an estimated 30% of Uzbekistan’s GDP.

Since the collapse of the USSR, various attempts have been made to (re)integrate the newly independent republics, but they have proved largely ineffective. These initiatives have been seen as vehicles for Russia’s traditional dominance of the region, expressed in a mix of crude power and institutional weakness, and wrapped up in historical discourses.

The formation of the Eurasian Customs Union (ECU) would appear to change this. While its economic rationale remains debatable, the ECU has been set up as a rule-based organization conforming to World Trade Organization (WTO) regulations and modern international norms. At the same time, it is clearly seen by Russia as a vehicle for reintegrating the post-Soviet space and offering a modernizing alternative to the EU.

‘Eurasian Customs Union …. is clearly seen by Russia as a vehicle for reintegrating the post-Soviet space and offering a modernizing alternative to the EU.’

This is particularly significant for Ukraine, where Russia has been actively promoting the ECU as an alternative to the EU integration mechanism, the Association Agreement. Given the apparent viability of the ECU, this rivalry is likely to grow and will require other international organisations, such as the EU, to adjust their strategies.

The Eurasian Customs Union: continuity or change?

The main significance of the ECU is its departure from previous initiatives for integration in the post-Soviet space.

The first and best-known of these was the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), which proved a mere vehicle for channelling the orderly disintegration of the Soviet Union, rather than the re-integration of its former republics. By the mid-1990s Russia’s focus shifted to investing in smaller groupings and the origins of the ECU date back to 1995, when Russia signed a treaty for the formation of a customs union with Belarus and Kazakhstan (Kyrgyzstan joined in 1996 and Tajikistan in 1997). This initiative retained the ineffective CIS institutional formula. Putin’s accession to the presidency, however, added a new impetus to the project and in 2000 the grouping was transformed into a fully-fledged international organization, the Eurasian Economic Community (EEC), although many of the old problems persisted, putting its effectiveness in question.

However, the middle of the 2000s saw the emergence of a vanguard group of states. The leaders of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan decided to set up a customs union in 2006, and swiftly established a Customs Union Commission as a permanent executive body. The group launched a common customs tariff in January 2010; in July 2010, the common customs territory was declared and the Customs Union Code, the key regulatory document, adopted. In July 2011, internal physical border controls were eliminated between the member states.

‘…the member states aim to progress towards an economic union with a common market of goods, capital and labour, and the operation of common macroeconomic, competition, financial and other regulation, including the harmonization of policies such as energy and transport.’

Their ambitions did not stop there: the member states aim to progress towards an economic union with a common market of goods, capital and labour, and the operation of common macroeconomic, competition, financial and other regulation, including the harmonization of policies such as energy and transport. This Eurasian Economic Union is due to be launched in January 2015.

Integration with a difference?

While we need to retain a degree of healthy scepticism about the transition to the Eurasian Economic Union, developments so far signal a pivotal change in integration patterns. The ECU offers a forward looking integration model that is a clear improvement on previous initiatives in terms of both design and implementation. The Union operates in the context of Russia’s accession to the WTO: while Belarus and Kazakhstan remain outside it, Russia’s accession protocol is designed to become an integral part of the legal framework of the ECU. So the Union represents a modernized economic regime, very different from previous attempts at regional integration within the post-Soviet space.

Undoubtedly the question remains whether Russia will be bound by this multilateral regime. Previous regional groupings were very asymmetric, allowing Russia to use its superior bargaining power and avoid being bound by potentially costly decisions. Yet there are indications that Russia may be prepared to move towards greater multilateralism and, at least in theory, it can be outvoted by its partners on certain types of decision.

It is clear that much of the progress so far has been dependent on the personalities of the leaders in the three countries (Putin, Nazarbayev and Lukashenko), making the union vulnerable to any leadership changes. But despite the reliance on personalities, the ECU is different from its predecessors not only in terms of the political will that is driving it forward, but also, crucially, in terms of its institutional effectiveness. The removal of internal borders, despite transitional periods in relation to the Russia–Kazakhstan border, symbolizes this. This means that the ECU cannot be reversed without cost. It is likely to stay.

This ambitious deepening of the ECU has coincided with a drive to widen it by making it a ‘centre of attraction’. Russia has viewed the ECU as a core for the wider integration of its ‘near abroad’, and in Kyrgyzstan, for example, accession to the ECU is high on the political agenda. But the most important battleground is Ukraine.

'This ambitious deepening of the ECU has coincided with a drive to widen it by making it a ‘centre of attraction’. Russia has viewed the ECU as a core for the wider integration of its ‘near abroad’, and in Kyrgyzstan, for example, accession to the ECU is high on the political agenda. But the most important battleground is Ukraine.'

This is not the first time Russia has sought to include Ukraine in a regional integration initiative. But it is the approach to Ukraine that illustrates the shift in Russian policy most clearly, because it is presenting the ECU as a ‘governance-based’ vehicle in direct competition with the EU.

Russia’s export of governance in the ‘shared neighbourhood’

The ECU is the vehicle through which Russia is increasingly engaging in ‘normative rivalry’ with the EU in the so-called ‘shared neighbourhood’ (i.e. Ukraine, Belarus, Moldova, Azerbaijan, Georgia and Armenia). Russia has begun to compete in a domain where until now the EU has exercised a monopoly.

The European Union, which launched the European Neighbourhood Policy (ENP) and the Eastern Partnership in the 2000s, has been seen (and regards itself) as the primary source of modernization and improved governance in the post-Soviet space. It promotes a rule-based, future-orientated economic integration regime designed in accordance with its own governance model via an offer of Association Agreements, Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas (DCFTA), Visa Facilitation Agreements and full visa liberalization in the long term – but not membership.

The DCFTA goes beyond a ‘standard’ free trade agreement, entailing major changes in the regulatory framework of the country associated with the EU in a wide range of areas. The expected benefits of such an agreement are capabilities so far lacking in most of the eastern neighbours: the ability to sustain reforms or a degree of confidence in the economy thanks to improved domestic institutions and system of economic governance. The EU has offered Association Agreements, with the DCFTA, to all post-Soviet countries in Europe which are also members of the WTO (i.e. Ukraine, Moldova, Armenia and Georgia).

Ukraine

Russia has endeavoured to undermine the rationale for Ukraine’s political association and free trade agreement with the EU. Ukraine was the first country to conclude negotiations on an Association Agreement (although it is yet to be signed and ratified). In 2011 Russia came up with its own offer, presenting a forceful economic counterargument.

'The EU has offered Association Agreements, with the DCFTA, to all post-Soviet countries in Europe which are also members of the WTO (i.e. Ukraine, Moldova, Armenia and Georgia).'

Joining the ECU would apparently benefit Ukraine to the extent of $219 billion of increased GDP between 2011 and 2030 (i.e. $12.2 billion per annum at 2010 prices). Joining the ECU would allow Ukraine to retain access to the Russian market, particularly for its agricultural products. As Putin put it, ‘No one is letting Ukraine in; we are.’

So far the EU has not responded in any concerted way to the anti-DCFTA campaign in Ukraine. It is no doubt relying on its own ‘power of attraction’ and Ukraine’s long-standing ‘European choice’. Recurring fatigue and disillusionment with the country mean that the EU has largely failed to promote this flagship and pioneering agreement effectively in Ukraine.

Russia, meanwhile, is not relying solely on promised economic gains for Ukraine, and is backing up its invitation with a traditional ‘carrot-and-stick’ approach. The incentive comes in the form of a reduced price for gas, benefiting Ukraine by up to $8 billion per annum. The penalty, on the other hand, would consist of economic sanctions against Ukraine, which would be primarily justified in terms of the negative implications for Russia of the EU–Ukraine DCFTA. Russia is hinting at deploying a range of mechanisms to ‘persuade’ Ukraine of the ‘benefits’ of the ECU. This reinforces the perception of the initiative as a vehicle for projecting Russian power, particularly as the Russian approach also makes it more difficult to resist the ‘offer’.

What punitive measures could Russia introduce? These could range from applying anti-dumping tariffs and limiting imports of Ukrainian food products through the application of phytosanitary standards for plant and plant products, to lowering the quotas for steel pipes – a key export for Ukraine. Selective, targeted sanctions have already been repeatedly deployed by Russia against states such as Moldova, Ukraine or Georgia, which are deemed to be pursuing unfriendly policies.

But how far could Russia go in ‘punishing’ Ukraine? Russia’s membership of the WTO precludes it from using certain punitive trade measures, and Ukraine, as an existing member, could resort to WTO mechanisms to address politically-motivated trade sanctions. However, Russia may take extra-legal measures, in contravention of WTO rules. Ultimately, it is difficult for Ukraine to make a choice based on a prediction of Russia’s propensity to break the rules of the organization to which it has just acceded.

This campaign complicates Ukraine’s already difficult relations with the EU. The signing of the Association Agreement has been put on ice owing to the deterioration of democratic standards in Ukraine, as evidenced above all by the political prosecution of opposition figures such as former prime minister Yulia Tymoshenko. These prosecutions have been loudly condemned by EU institutions and member states as a clear breach of democratic standards and the rule of law.

By contrast, the ECU does not require its current and prospective member states to conform to any democratic standards. Ukraine is being invited to join with no political conditions attached, and given that Russia’s offer comes at a sensitive moment in Ukrainian–EU relations, it represents a significant counterweight to the EU’s democratic demands.

The campaign to persuade Ukraine to abandon the Association Agreement with the EU could be seen as a short-lived attempt to attract the country at a time when the authorities have declared their interest in concluding the Agreement rather than opting for the ECU. However, this is not just a matter of short-term choice but also a longer-term conflict of interests. Even if and when the Association Agreement is concluded, its implementation will be prolonged, costly and highly sensitive for Ukraine in both political and economic terms. Ukraine’s dependence on the Russian market means that the country has to adapt simultaneously to two competitive integration regimes, the EU and the ECU.

'Ukraine’s dependence on the Russian market means that the country has to adapt simultaneously to two competitive integration regimes, the EU and the ECU.'

This context gives Russia plenty of opportunities to offer incentives and disincentives to slow down or jeopardize the implementation of the Association Agreement. Integration with the EU is certainly premised on the lengthening of the time horizons of Ukraine’s political class, essential if the country is to embark on the political and economic reforms that would generate benefits in the medium to long term (5–10 years). Russia is well positioned to offer beneficial mutual conditions, changing the stakes and shortening the time frame.  

Conclusion

While EU–Russian relations have remained static in the last decade, the same cannot be said of their respective relations with the countries in the ‘shared neighbourhood’. Recently, Russia has been putting a premium on rule-based economic integration with robust institutional regimes. It is, however,  highly uncertain whether such a rapid pace of integration can be maintained, to allow the  projected creation of the Eurasian Economic Union by 2015.

Yet what has been achieved so far provides a firm institutional basis for economic integration. As such it means that a viable form of advanced economic integration has emerged in the post-Soviet space, in direct competition to that offered by the EU, and has, moreover, moved Russia into rivalry with the EU in a domain in which the EU has not yet been challenged on the European continent.

For more detailed analysis see R. Dragneva and K. Wolczuk, 'Russia, the Eurasian Customs Union and the EU: Cooperation, Stagnation or Rivalry?' (August 6, 2012). Chatham House Briefing Paper REP BP 2012/01 available at http://www.chathamhouse.org/publications/papers/view/185165

Since independence in 1991, Kazakhstan’s ‘southern capital’, Almaty, has engaged in fairly extensive efforts at ‘Kazakhising’ local toponyms. Now the central arteries of the city, once part of the old Soviet planimetry, display ‘genuinely’ Kazakh names. Streets once bearing the names of Bolshevik icons like Kalinin and Kirov are now named after legendary heroes (Kabanbai Batyr) or other figures from Kazakhstan’s nomadic past (Bogenbai Batyr).

'The local rumour is that the ‘Kazakhization’ of Furmanova ulitsa has been put on hold until the passing of Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, when this leafy street in Almaty will be renamed after the first President of post-Soviet Kazakhstan.'

Surprisingly, however, the street named after Bolshevik writer Dmitry Furmanov has retained its original Soviet name. The local rumour is that the ‘Kazakhization’ of Furmanova ulitsa has been put on hold until the passing of Nursultan A. Nazarbayev, when this leafy street in Almaty will be renamed after the first President of post-Soviet Kazakhstan.

Political speculation

The example of Furmanova ulitsa offers a fitting metaphor to describe the sense of political stagnation that pervades today’s Kazakhstan. A sense that much-needed change has been postponed until the inevitable, though not yet imminent, leadership change.

Externally, the Kazakhstani government continues to promote its image of internal dynamism and international leadership. Success in obtaining the rotating chairmanships of prestigious multinational organisations such as the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation and OSCE is treated as an indicator of Kazakhstan’s international vitality.Data on GDP growth and economic vigour are often offered in support of this narrative.

However, when the situation is observed internally, it seems that Kazakhstan’s politico-economic evolution has definitely entered an intermediate stage, in which the (authoritarian) impetus of the 1990s and the 2000s has been replaced by the immobility typical of the end of an era.

The makings of a political cul-de-sac

Virtually every political conversation going on in the country touches sooner or later on the critical issue of what will happen when Nazarbayev leaves power. And debates on the President’s (political and biological) longevity are usually accompanied by speculations on the existence of potential arrangements for a pre-determined succession.

It was through this very prism that commentators analysed the reshuffle of late September 2012, when outgoing Prime Minister Karim Masimov was appointed to run the Presidential Administration. Similarly, in December 2011, the dismissal of Timur Kulibayev (one of Nazarbayev’s sons-in-law) from the chairmanship of Samruk-Kazyna, Kazakhstan’s sovereign fund, stimulated much debate about the importance of family connections for the presidential succession.

'In Kazakhstan, as in the rest of post-Soviet Central Asia, power can be considered as the function of one’s proximity to the President.'

In Kazakhstan, as in the rest of post-Soviet Central Asia, power can be considered as the function of one’s proximity to the President. Masimov’s career trajectory can thus be regarded as a significant promotion, and Kulibayev’s marginalisation as a weakening of his power position.

The country remains locked in all kinds of speculation, periodically reinforced by news of Nazarbayev’s failing health. All the while, political, economic and social decisions still have to be taken. and Kazakhstan’s foreign policy machinery still has to identify new ways to increase the regime’s international legitimacy. The junction that the Kazakhstani regime has entered is thus, in effect, a political cul-de-sac. For the moment, high oil prices continue to support the Kazakhstani economy and sustain record GDP growth, though there are no guarantees that will continue.

It is possible to identify the precise moment at which Kazakhstan entered this phase of possibly irreversible decline, and that is Nazarbayev’s decision to run in the snap presidential election of early 2011. By entering his third decade at the helm, Nazarbayev, who turned 72 last July, manifested his intention of remaining in power indefinitely.

'Kazakhstan’s decision-making mechanisms appear to have lost much of their momentum, leaving the country stagnating in both political and social terms'

He thus established an invisible link between his mortality and the power position of the elite that supported him throughout the post-Soviet era.

Dealing with opposition

Two things mark the post-election landscape: the appearance of a more stable regime and the neutralisation of every form of internal opposition. The neutralisation happened quickly, and targeted both discontent within the elite, as with the radicalisation of society, which in the recent months had come to be viewed as even more dangerous.

The ongoing struggle for labour rights in the Mangystau oblast [region]obviously represents the most visible aspect of the radicalisation of Kazakhstani politics. At the same time, a substantive part of the dissent has been channelled through more violent outbursts, which have been presented as conclusive evidence of Islamist resurgence in Kazakhstan. The country, in recent times, experienced its very firstsuicide bombing (Aktobe, July 2011), another deadly attack was carried out in Atyrau in late October 2011, while, on 12 November 2011, a more brutal attack claimed several lives in the southern city of Taraz.

The Nazarbayev regime’s response was implacable: repression was adopted as the uniform reaction to these very different expressions of discontent. The state’s brutal response to the demonstrations of oil workers in Zhanaozen, and the draconian law on religious rights introduced in the aftermath of the 2011 attacks are hence two sides of the same coin. They reveal the struggling outlook of a stagnating regime that is no longer capable of effective policy-making and has resorted to classic authoritarian methods in its dealing with the wider population. This sense of decline is perfectly captured by the images coming from Zhanaozen, where, on the day in which the country was celebrating the 20th anniversary of independence (16 December 2011), Kazakhstani armed forces opened fire on citizens demonstrating in the street.

An Islamist threat?

There is, however, more than brutal repression and punishing legislation to the confrontational tendencies that have emerged in Kazakhstani politics. The 2011 wave of terrorist attacks allowed the government to capitalise increasingly on the population’s sense of insecurity. This consideration became crucially important in the stagnating panorama of post-2011 Kazakhstan, with the regime flagging up an ‘Islamist threat’ while outlining its plans for tighter security.

This is a very different reaction from that of Uzbek President Islam Karimov to the events of 9/11: he embarked upon a similar campaign to increase the country’s international prestige. In Kazakhstan, however, the alleged resurgence of radical Islam has served Nazarbayev and his associates in their efforts to recuperate some of the internal legitimacy lost in Zhanaozen. As a consequence, more than half of the Kazakhstani mosques are now monitored through CCTV systems, the regime continues to show unease at foreign-trained religious leaders, and a fully-fledged scare campaign is underway (with media, especially radio, increasingly denouncing the oddities of Wahhabism and other extreme interpretations of the Islamic credo).

'The regime’s systematic refusal to engage in political dialogue and its deliberate plans to marginalise any unsanctioned manifestation of Islamic sentiment have emerged as two pillars of the leadership’s domestic position.'

While there is no conclusive evidence regarding the genuine radicalisation of Kazakhstani Islam, there can be virtually no doubt about the existence of a concerted scare campaign against Islam. An example might be useful here: immediately after the discovery of the bodies of 14 Kazakhstani border guards and one ranger in the Almaty oblast (May 2012), local sources attributed responsibility for the murder to a cell of Saudi Salafis aiming to sabotage the Kazakhstan-China relationship. Although the killing was later attributed to the homicidal outburst of another border guard, an aura of mystery still shrouds public perception of the event, which continues occasionally to be described as a manifestation of Islamic violence in Kazakhstan.

The regime’s systematic refusal to engage in political dialogue with the opposition and its deliberate plans to marginalise any unsanctioned manifestation of Islamic sentiment have hence emerged as two pillars of the leadership’s domestic position. This intransigence, in all likelihood, will continue to characterise Kazakhstani governance until the end of the Nazarbayev era.

Kazakhstan’s future outlook, in this sense, does not appear bright, as the rapid deterioration of whatever little internal dialogue had survived 20 years of fictitious liberalisation is now exacerbating the socio-political stagnation into which the regime slid in 2011. As in the case of Furmanovaulitsa, change for Kazakhstan is postponed to a later date.

When Peter the Great built St Petersburg, Russia looked firmly towards the West. Conversely, Russia’s eastern provinces – often considered peripheral – stay connected with China and Asia. Geography is one thing, but strategic choice is quite another. During the Cold War,  strategic trenches were dug between the US and Russia’s predecessor, the Soviet Union. In this scenario, China was the minor third partner pivoting between the USSR and the US. Now the question has moved on to instead how Russia in the years to come will orient itself, towards East or West, in the growing power game focussed on China.  

Strategic alliances

Russia will choose from any number of different and opposing visions for Russia. In his book Strategic Vision, American geo-strategistBrzezinski argues that Russia should form part of a more ‘vigorous West’, suggesting that long-term strategic planners in the US and the EU should seek to enlarge the West by including Russia. He is of the opinion that Russian thinkers and leaders need to understand that their country is much closer to the EU and the US than to China. 

‘Russian ‘nostalgia for a leading global role’ leads it to conclude that the relative decline of the US would be to its advantage.

Yet it is Russian ‘nostalgia for a leading global role’ that makes it incapable of seeing long-term on this and leads it to conclude that the relative decline of the US would be to its advantage.  In such a strategic reading, the partnership with China will probably be temporary because, in the long run, China will overshadow Russia. Thus, Russia should not be satisfied with siding with China in their ‘coalition of the unwilling’.  

In the same vein, a European Council on Foreign Relations (ECFR) report argued that Russia was ‘post-BRIC’, meaning that it was not attaining the booming economic standards of the other emerging powers, particularly China. Others have taken the argument further: right-wing US Congressman Dana Rohrabacher suggests forging an alliance with Russia, Japan and India for the purpose of containing the Chinese threat. 

Brzezinski’s thinking is far-sighted. Yet official US policy doesn’t necessarily reflect it and the earlier ‘reset’ with Russia and the later ‘pivot’ towards Asia were thought up in their own self-contained strategic bubbles.  In the EU, this type of thinking is quite absent from policy: Russia is narrowly viewed through a bilateral lens and there is no calibrating of policy towards the position of either Russia or the EU in the Pacific Century.  

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Might superpower hubris lead Russia on a one-way track to becoming China's junior partner? Photo: (c) RIA Novosti/Sergei Guneev

On the other side of the coin (and the world), Yan Xuetong, one of China’s geo-strategic hawks, proposes in the ECFR debate book, China 3.0, that China and Russia should form a strategic alliance. There is already a large overlap in their world view, as can be detected in China and Russia’s ‘veto entente’ with its joint track record of vetoes in the Security Council (Myanmar, Zimbabwe, and Syria). Like Brzezinski in the US, Yan Xuetong doesn’t represent the official government line, which is more cautious. This move would be a big change for the Chinese because official policy on relations with Russia is informed by the principle of non-alignment. What could bring official policy closer to Yan’s viewpoint would be a move towards a containment strategy and China would need increase its number of allies. Actually, Yan Xuetong thinks the current Chinese policy has already failed to yield results and argues for the necessity of forming this alliance to ‘shift the world from unipolarity to bipolarity’, in short as a means to bring down the US faster  

Russia and China

The subtlety in Yan’s wording deserves our attention. He writes that the Russia-China alliance will bring about bipolarity, not multipolarity. Does he mean that an alliance with Russia would help elevate China to equal position with the US, rather than make Russia and other powers into equal poles in a more multipolar system?  If Yan’s use of bipolarity is to be interpreted that way, it would mean an instrumental alliance that helps China take the last step into the G-2 or bipolar order, leaving Russia behind in the second tier. 

‘Russia’s major strategic focus is still towards its Western partners, which still make up half its trade, but there is a growing realisation of the need to turn towards the Asian economic power house.’ 

This possible outcome of a strong Russia-China relationship worries some people in Russia. Sergey Karaganov reflects in an op-ed that Russia could become ‘an appendage of China – a warehouse of resources’. To avoid that fate, the country needs a larger-scale Asia strategy, which Karaganov coins as ‘project Siberia.’ This would ensure that investments filter into Russia’s remote Asian regions, not just from China but more broad-based, so that economic development simultaneously guarantees Russian sovereignty. 

These two extremes show the pull factor from West and East on Russia. Actual policy tends to end up in the middle ground, described by some as lack of strategic choice and others as necessary strategic flexibility 

Russia’s major strategic focus is still towards its Western partners, which still make up half its trade, but there is a growing realisation of the need to turn towards the Asian economic power house. Russia has joined the main multilateral institutions from the East Asia Summit, Six Party Talks on North Korea to Shanghai Cooperation Organisation (SCO), but the Russian impact in strategic Asian affairs is still limited. For example, SCO, set up by China and Russia jointly with Central Asia, reflects the gradual power erosion in China’s favour, as analyst Pavel Salin notes.  This was evident in 2008 when Russia called for the organisation to anoint its incursion into Georgia and for the establishment of two new autonomous republics (Abkhazia and South Ossetia). China, seeing repercussions for its own Taiwan-situation, blocked this by clever back-door diplomacy with Central Asian states.

Still, official policy is much more anti-Western than China-sceptic, as political scientist Igor Zevelev points out. For Russia, joining up with China to put a spoke in the wheels of the US seems more important.  China’s military growth and more muscular policy with its neighbours have not had a profound effect on Russia. In opinion polls on potential adversaries, the US outpaces China by 20%, so China can’t spook the public in Russia as it can in the US. ‘Russia continues to view China as an Asian neighbour and key economic partner, but not as a new global power’ says Zevelev. 

Russian thinking isn’t without its concerns about an uncertain future with China. Editor-in-chief of Russia in Global Affairs JournalFyodor Lukyanov, for example, highlighted the risks for Russia ‘in the growth of China’s economic potential and international status’. In a similar spirit of hedging bets, the Russian Navy participated for the first time in the US-hosted Pacific Rim Exercise 2012 (RIMPAC). 

In the end, Russia might not pivot anywhere, thus making neither American nor Chinese geostrategic dreams come true. Russia could remain in a strategic ostrich position between East and West in the years ahead. If this strategic flexibility is well orchestrated, it could turn out to give Russia short-term leverage both in the East and the West. Yet there is also a danger that when, and if, it looks up and East, it will see that its Asian neighbour China is a global power in a league of its own, a realisation which will have serious implications for Russia.       

Astana, December 2010. The OSCE summit is approaching an inconclusive end. In preparing the meeting’s final document, the parties seem incapable of reaching consensus on any of the several drafts, leaving the Kazakhstani government – the summit’s host – facing one of its worst nightmares: failure on the international stage. Just as the proceedings are drawing to a close, Silvio Berlusconi – then Italy’s Prime Minister – intervenes to negotiate a last-minute communiqué on ‘security in Eurasia.’ Pushing his colleagues to endorse the declaration, the Italian PM remarks that the document has the preliminary approval of the elder statesmen in both the West and the East – Berlusconi himself and Nursultan Nazarbayev, the president of Kazakhstan. Rather quickly, the plenary assembly approves the Astana Declaration; Berlusconi returns home to face his many political troubles; and Kazakhstan can chalk up another achievement in its long-term search for international legitimacy.

The Shalabayeva affair

Until recently, the Astana summit represented a rare public manifestation of one of the worst kept secrets in international affairs: the dangerous liaison between Berlusconi and Nazarbayev. In the last six weeks, however, the leaders’ personal ties have become the subject of public debate, when the Italian government facilitated the‘extraordinary rendition’ of family members of Nazarbayev’s principal opponent, Mukhtar Ablyazov.

On 29 May, Ablyazov’s wife, Alma Shalabayeva, and her six-year old daughter, were asleep in a villa in Rome; they were woken up in the middle of the night by a group of masked and armed men – variously said to be Italian intelligence agents or forces from the Ministry of the Interior – who said that they were looking for Mukhtar Ablyazov. Not finding him, they forcibly removed his wife and daughter from the house at gunpoint; and held them in custody pending deportation. Following a remarkably speedy expulsion process, on 31 May mother and daughter were forced by the Italian police onto a private jet and deported to Kazakhstan, on a special flight provided by the Kazakhstani government, with the Kazakhstani ambassador to Italy on board. The Italian authorities claimed there were irregularities in Shalabayeva’s documents. However, Shalabeyeva’s lawyers have since provided evidence that her documents were legitimate; Mrs Shalabayeva and her daughter were living in Italy under an EU residence permit issued by the government of Latvia. They are currently being held in precautionary custody in Almaty.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The arrest of the family of a Kazakhstani opposition politician in the middle of Rome - and subsequent expatriation - raise serious concerns about how the EU deals with Central Asian dictatorships. Photo: ablyazov.org

On July 12th,  the Italian government retroactively rescinded the expulsion order, in belated recognition that the forced return had violated Italian law.

A foreign policy disaster

Courtesy of the Italian government – or the Italian Police, if you believe Angelino Alfano, Italy’s Deputy PM, Minister of Interior Affairs and political secretary of Berlusconi’s party – Nazarbayev now holds a very valuable trump card in his political fight against Mukhtar Ablyazov. The Italian press, is demanding Alfano’s resignation, and has quickly identified Silvio Berlusconi as the political mastermind of the Shalabayeva affair, a foreign policy disaster that is now threatening the already shaky foundations of the government headed by Enrico Letta.

Cosy relationships

The Shalabayeva affair, however, represents only the tip of the iceberg in the murky connections between Nazarbayev and Berlusconi, who share a fondness for conducting state business on the basis of long-standing friendships and personal associations with foreign leaders.

These personal political relationships have determined Kazakhstan’s approach to Central Asian politics throughout the period in which first-generation leaders ruled the other regional states. The long-standing friendship between Nazarbayev and the late Saparmurat Niyazov dominated Kazakhstani-Turkmenistani relations; and Nazarbayev’s personal ties to Askar Akaev similarly dominated the interaction between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, until the regime change in Bishkek (2005). With the notable exception of Berlusconi, however, Nazarbayev never managed to establish personal relations with his Western counterparts; he had to content himself with staged photo-calls; flattering enough for a leader obsessed with his international image.

L’amico

Berlusconi’s foreign policy was similarly personal. He has often explained Italy’s involvement in the 2003 occupation of Iraq as the result of his personal support for the policies of l’amico George (former US President George W. Bush) and l’amico Tony (former British PM Tony Blair). The former Italian PM rarely failed to extend the hand of friendship to less presentable heads of state: the rapprochement between Italy and Libya was sealed by the very personal relationship that Berlusconi established with Muammar al-Gaddafi, who was always granted special treatment when travelling to Rome.

In dealing with Central Asian dictators, Berlusconi tried hard to keep his friendships out of sight, although not always successfully. The embarrassment of the Berlusconi government was particularly visible in 2009, when Turkmenistani president Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov travelled to Italy. The Palazzo Chigi repeatedly denied that the visit was actually happening, and endeavoured to conceal Berdymuhamedov’s official schedule to Italian news outlets.

Obfuscation was never a part of Italian-Kazakhstani relations because, In Berlusconi’s view of geopolitics, the energy ties between Rome and Astana were too critical to be sacrificed on the altar of international respectability. Kazakhstan – the European Union’s fifth largest partner in the oil sector – is Italy’s main commercial partner in post-Soviet Central Asia, and the recipient of significant FDI in the otherwise struggling Italian industrial sector.

Quid pro quo

ENI, the Italian energy conglomerate (and, some would say, the economic arm of berlusconismo)in particular, has substantial economic interests in Kazakhstan, including direct involvement in the onshore Karachaganak field, and the offshore Kashagan project, both located in Western Kazakhstan. ENI’s involvement in Kazakhstan did not come without controversy: Paolo Scaroni, the long-term CEO of ENI, has been accused of paying bribes to family associates of Nazarbayev, to facilitate the granting of concessions to operate in the Kashagan project.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.A photo of smiling 'amici', proudly displayed on Nazarbayev's personal website. Photo: akorda.kz

Friendly ties with Nazarbayev have so far served the economic purposes of Berlusconi and his associates; and helped improve Nazarbayev’s international standing. The two leaders are known to enjoy each other’s company, giving rise to much press speculation about what they get up to: the Italian press is rife with rumours surrounding Berlusconi’s stay in Nazarbayev’s dacha; and Kazakhstan’s independent media outlet Respublika has been reporting on a July 2013 informal ‘summit’ held in Sardinia, where Nazarbayev was holidaying in a villa belonging to one of Berlusconi’s cronies.

A cover-up

The Shalabayeva affair is unpleasant, but so is the attempt at a cover-up. Berlusconi and Nazarbayev have both adopted a similarly condescending posture when publicly commenting on the event in question. Berlusconi flatly denied his personal association with Nazarbayev, remarking that, in ten years as head of government, he had only visited Kazakhstan on one occasion. Nazarbayev has so far refused to comment on the affair: beyond criticism, as he sees it, he directed the Kazakhstani Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Embassy in Rome to address the many media requests concerning the ‘extraordinary rendition’ of Mukhtar Ablyazov’s wife and daughter.

Silvio Berlusconi himself has nothing to lose from the forced extradition of Ablyazov’s family. His own party has no choice but to cover up his responsibility in the affair, as criticism of Berlusconi’s political decisions is not an option for members of the Popolo della Libertà. Berlusconi’s principal ally in the current government, the bitterly divided Partito Democratico, has no interest in prompting a government crisis; and has so far channelled its anger towards Angelino Alfano. Italy’s international reputation, on the other hand, has certainly been compromised by the Shalabayeva affair: the political and personal friendship of one Italian politician, for a foreign dictator with a record of human rights abuses, has allowed a democratic European state to engage in an act of illegal rendition.

The Italian Government colluded with a Central Asian dictator to remove his political opponent

One would not wish to paint Mukhtar Ablyazov as a man whiter than white – a warrant for his arrest on fraud charges, has been issued by the UK authorities - but, nevertheless, the Italian Government colluded with a Central Asian dictator to remove his political opponent. Even as Ablyazov is becoming less influential in Kazakstani politics, the Nazarbayev government is visibly obsessed with persecuting him, his family, and his political associates. The international pursuit of Ablyazov and his circle – besides Mrs Shalabayeva and her daughter, the Kazakhstani government has also requested extraditions of Ablyazov’s associates from Spain and Poland– is a further indication of the fragility of the Kazakhstani power system. The president’s age, his frail health and unwillingness to nominate a successor have fanned speculation about Nazarbayev’s political succession. Clearly, in hounding Albyazov, the aim of the regime is to prevent his involvement in the political process of a post-Nazarbayev era.

The Shalabayeva affair is nothing new in Central Asian politics; CIS governments have been regularly complying with each other’s requests for the extradition of opponents, and kidnapping and violence have often been used. The governments of Tajikistan and Uzbekistan have had great success with such methods. What is new, is the more unsettling fact that extraordinary rendition is now becoming common practice well beyond the CIS, with European states much less inclined to resist the extradition requests formulated by Central Asian republics, and post-Soviet states); thereby demonstrating scant regard for individuals likely to be tortured or persecuted post-extradition..

Realpolitik is dictating the protection of Western energy interests

The Shalabayeva affair highlights the inherent contradiction underpinning the uncritical relations that Western European democracies, and the wider European Union, have established with Central Asia’s dictatorships: paying lip service to human rights, while posing for photo-calls. Realpolitik is dictating the protection of Western energy interests, and simultaneously protecting the interests of dictators.

Kazakh banking is in a state of disarray, as banks assimilate the consequences of a recent 20% devaluation of the tenge, a surprise bid by the Central Bank to maintain export competitiveness with Russia, the country’s largest market. As a result, and notwithstanding Kazakhstan’s membership of the Customs Union, which includes Russia and Belarus, companies and individuals have had to pay a high price in terms of more expensive imports from Russia and the Russian bloc. The government, moreover, wants to deal with the consequences of its economic crisis of 2008, and is looking hard at the banking sector. Some restructured state banks are set to be sold to the private sector, with owners promising to initiate a much-needed banking consolidation in Kazakhstan.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Kenges Rakishev - one of the well-connected businessmen vying for control of BTA Bank. CC Kenges RakishevKazakhstan has 38 banks, but this number could be substantially reduced if some mergers go through. The catalysts in the process of banking consolidation are: local oligarch Bulat Utemuratov, who is currently seeking to push together Alliance and Temir banks; and Kazkomertzbank, with its partner Kenges Rakishev, who is seeking to acquire BTA. Both deals are currently under negotiation with Samruk-Kazyna, the sovereign wealth fund, which owns the stakes.

Both Utemuratov and Rakishev are well-connected confidants of the president. Utemuratov is married to the president’s daughter Dinara, while Rakishev is married to the daughter of Imangali Tasmagambetov, the mayor of Astana, and a former prime minister in the early 2000s. Rakishev, who is 34, owns the SAT conglomerate, and is regarded as a young turk in the business establishment.

Background

Banks in Kazakhstan can broadly be divided into four groups. Some Kazakh banks suffered badly post-2008, and were taken over either by Samruk-Kazyna or the government directly; these banks are routinely described as ‘restructured banks,’ and they are under close watch. Their balance sheets need to be cleaned up, with some three-quarters of their loans non-performing.

Even those first-tier banks that experienced difficulties in the crisis but managed to ride it out without support have NPLs (Non Performing Loans) of between 15% and 40% of their balance sheets.

The third tier of some 15 banks has found market opportunities in the carnage that was the crisis; and they have started growing their business. Eurasia is one such bank, with between 5% and 15% of NPLs.

The final group of banks entered the country after the crisis, and they have remained relatively unscathed from the economic downturn. Their NPLs stand at less than 5%. 

Market growth

Corporates are proving a rich source of revenue for banks; and the oil and gas, mining and infrastructure sectors have all expanded with the economy. However, banking for small- and medium-sized enterprises, on the other hand, has seen little growth, and is experiencing marginal stagnation, a result of regulatory hurdles and poor credit worthiness.

The highlight for Kazakh banking has been the retail sector, which has grown considerably as GDP has increased and the general population has started consuming again. The rate of growth over the last four years has been impressive, and this has resulted in a boom in car loans, credit cards, and mortgage business.

‘The marketplace and the banking population show that Kazakhstan is over-banked.’

Over-banked

Looking at this mixed picture, Alexander Kottmann, PWC’s financial services director in Kazakhstan, thinks consolidation is a given: 'We will see some consolidation happening. The marketplace and the banking population show that Kazakhstan is over-banked.’ The introduction of Basel Three capital ratios will push smaller banks into the arms of the larger, he says. ‘If you look at the proposed capital increases, this is quite significant, and by full introduction in 2019 it will require many banks to go to the market to look for additional equity funding, which is quite difficult given the overall state of the Kazakh banking sector. They compete for equity not only against other banks but also other industries, which is obviously difficult if there's a more promising return for investors.’

Potential buyers have deep pockets. Bulat Utemuratov, for example, who has bought an 80% stake in state-owned Temir Bank, as a prelude to buying Alliance Bank and merging the two, is one of Kazakhstan’s long-standing banking oligarchs. He not only controls Forte Bank and Kassa Nova Bank, but is also involved with Verny Capital, a well financed private equity fund, which owns a 1.33% stake in Glencore Xstrata, the massive commodities and natural resources trader and operator. Verny has bank management skills – the senior partner is Timur Isatayev, former managing director of ATF Bank – and these will be harnessed to manage the merger of Temir and Alliance.

Wheeler-dealing

Verny, which has assets in a wide range of local sectors including hotels, is funded by the proceeds of what has been termed the Kazakh ‘banking deal of the century,’ when Utemuratov sold ATF Bank, the fifth largest lender by assets, to the Italian UniCredito for £1.25 billion at the height of the credit boom, in 2007. In late 2012, UniCredito offloaded ATF, which had been founded by Utemuratov, for no more than the size of its equity, valued at less than £300m, to KazNitrogenGaz, the vehicle of Galimzhan Yesenov, the son-in-law of Akhmetzhan Yesimov, the influential mayor of Almaty.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.BTA Headquarters in Kazakhstan. Though widely known as a retail bank, BTA Bank is suffering from a mass of bad loans. CC Esetok

New money is also set to enter the banking market with the sale to Kenges Rakishev of 46.5% of BTA Bank. Rakishev’s interests, through his SAT conglomerate, are spread around engineering, technology and natural resources, rather than financial services. Rakishev has formed a partnership with KazKommertsBank (KKB), where KKB has an interest in a 4% stake held by Samruk-Kazyna, to give it overall control. Local analysts say the deal cost the two parties between £120m and £268m.

Bad loans

The process of consolidation, however, is unlikely to be straightforward for two reasons. First, the outstanding bad loan picture is still far from clear, with daily surprises making the prospect of improving the loan book, everywhere more arduous. Bad loans are a feature of every Kazakh bank loan book – a legacy of an unresolved pre-crisis property boom -– with an average of 30% of bad loans. Second, an organisational restructuring is required for both Temir and Alliance banks, involving staff and IT systems.

‘This minefield hasn’t been cleared yet and mines keep exploding.’

The rapid deterioration of the bad loan portfolio was outlined by Timur Issatayev, who explained to a group of analysts that, ‘This minefield hasn’t been cleared yet and mines keep exploding.’ Two of the banks’ major state borrowers in the agricultural sector, he said, were ‘about to declare bankruptcy,’ leading to a non-payment of £60m worth of loans. The combined Alliance and Temir banks will also have an extensive property portfolio, ranging from prime real estate to countryside greenfield investments. Issatayev, however, warned that one property, which was on the books at 30m tenge, could be sold for no more than 7m tenge, while another that was on the books at 100m tenge could be sold for just 50m tenge. He said, ‘There are huge holdings of real estate which all banks have on their balance sheets. We realise the challenges; we will only depress the market by putting up for sale half of each bank. No one has ever done something of this magnitude before in Kazakhstan.’

‘No one has ever done something of this magnitude before in Kazakhstan.’

Incompatible IT systems

Overstaffing and incompatible IT systems also confront the managers of Verny, tasked with pushing together Temir and Alliance. The greater strategic challenge is building a unified IT system says Guram Andronikashvili, CEO of Forte Bank (Kazakhstan): ‘It is a two-step process. Alliance runs two systems, one for retail and one for corporate. Temir runs an outdated system. The first challenge will be to move all the business of Alliance into a new expanded banking system, then put the Temir business into the Alliance platform. The IT platform at Alliance also needs to be improved to accept Temir.’ Alliance managers are driving a process that will result in Temir’s absorption, says Andronikashvili. ‘The size of tasks Alliance is facing is much bigger. The IT expertise required for Alliance is much greater, so that is the focus.’

Moreover, the planned job-cuts threaten to create a storm in the country say the bank’s leaders. Verny is planning to dispense with 3,500 staff out of a combined total of 6,100. Andronikashvili says, ‘A huge challenge is disposing of staff. This would be an unprecedented shedding of labour.’

BTA Bank, whose assets were put at £6.2 billion in October 2013, continues to track down the loans made by former CEO Mukhtar Ablyazov.

BTA and KKB

The likely structure of the merger between BTA and KKB remains mired in concerns about the scale of the bad loans portfolio. BTA bank, whose assets were put at £6.2 billion in October 2013, continues to track down the loans made by former CEO Mukhtar Ablyazov, who is a fugitive currently in jail in France, and facing extradition to Russia. He is charged with perpetrating a massive fraud on the bank. Pavel Prosyankin, the BTA board consultant (and former managing director) who has been pursuing the loans over the last four years, says that ‘there is no exact value placed on what can be recovered.’  He says that ‘no more than a few hundred million dollars’ worth of loans have been turned into liquid cash. Chris Hardman, the lawyer at Hogan Lovells, the London lawyers hired to pursue Ablyazov, says that the former CEO made £8.9 billion worth of fraudulent loans.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Mukhtar Ablyazov, currently in prison in France, may have made up to £8.9bn in fraudulent loads. CC 1612TV

One local banker speculated that Ablyazov-related loans may be amalgamated with other BTA bad loans and placed into a ‘bad bank’ inside BTA. KKB would put BTA’s performing loan portfolio into a ‘good bank’ based round KKB. Prosyankin says, ‘they may function as two separate banks for some time. It doesn’t affect the asset recovery. The new shareholders have to decide whether the experts at KKB should examine the bad loan book at BTA that is not Ablyazov-related. KKB has a great deal of experience, as the largest bank, in dealing with bad loans in Kazakhstan.’

Merger costs will be saved if BTA is retained as a retail-facing brand, and KKB focused on corporates, says Anton Soroko, an analyst from FINAM Investment Holding: ‘The most likely scenario of this deal would be to divide the business between the two owners into retail and corporate ones. This way there will be no need to spend money on a re-branding, since BTA bank is well known in Kazakhstan, and the new owners should build on the brand's visibility.’

NPLs present a particular problem to Kazakh banks because tax rules make it particularly difficult to allow banks to wipe off bad loans.

A write off

NPLs present a particular problem to Kazakh banks because esoteric tax rules make it particularly difficult for banks to wipe off bad loans. According to one Kazakh banker, ‘In most jurisdictions, banks say, ‘We are never going to get back the money we lent so we’ll write it off; this is the difference between a provision and a write off… when you write it off, that’s it. In most countries, when you write it off, eventually your NPL rate comes down. But in Kazakhstan, if you take a write off, under current rules, they make you pay back the 20% of the tax benefit; in short it costs you money to do a write off.’  As a result of this rule, he says, ‘No one in Kazakhstan writes anything off; they just sit there forever with this NPL. When our competitors deem something unrecoverable, they write it off and move on. Now, if a Kazakh bank has a 30% NPL rate and a Russian bank has a 8% NPL rate, some would say on that basis that the problem in Kazakhstan is four times worse than in Russia. But Russian banks are able to include write-offs over time. Kazakh banks are being unfairly penalised against their peers because the statistics look worse than they are on a relative basis.’

The broader picture

The growing consumer market remains of keen interest to all banks. Eurasian Bank, for example, which focuses on the retail consumer, has seen considerable growth in mortgages, personal and car loans, says Michael Eggleton, the CEO. This rate of general consumer growth, however, causes concerns for Charles Seville at Fitch Ratings, ‘household debt to GDP is very low compared to the developed world, but the level of household debt is rising, and the share of debt to disposable income is rising to high levels. It is not frightening yet, but we could see problems in the banks’ loan books if this growth in consumer lending continues.’

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Visual map of Kazakhstan's economy by sector. Oil and Gas continue to predominate. CC Haussmann, Cesar Hidalgo, et.al.

How will Kazakhstan’s banks handle the recent 20% in the devaluation of the tenge? Pavel Prosyankin says, ‘Banks that are in compliance with their regulatory requirements for currency exposure, shouldn’t be affected. But longer term, it may affect their largest clients and it will squeeze their liquidity positions. Clients may then turn to the banks for additional lending, but the banks may not have the resources to lend. The devaluation may have a knock-on effect on their deposit base, and that could cause a run on a weak bank.’

‘We don’t understand why anyone would risk money in this way.’

While the underlying Kazakh economy remains strong, with annual 5% GDP growth, based on a high oil price, scepticism about current banking sector manoeuvres pervades the local market. Almas Chukin, a former executive with Kazyna Capital Management, says ‘We are puzzled. We don’t understand why anyone would risk money in this way. The banks the government is selling are all in very bad shape. Why are people prepared to risk so much money trying to make money? Most of us are very doubtful. We don’t know what their motives are.’ 

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.It's not surprising that some of the states in Central Asia spy on people. Authoritarianism across the world relies on the intrusion into, and lack thereof, of a private sphere. From the KGB to their modern incarnations, the autocracies in the region continue to rely on state surveillance and other entrenched means of political control to stay in power.

New technologies and communications means, heralded as great tools of progress, are being met the world over with censorship and surveillance. At best this minimises the utility of these technologies; at worst, it turns them into tools for unprecedented state spying and repression.   

What may be somewhat surprising in Central Asia is the sophistication of some of the surveillance technologies that are being used, and the amount of foreign companies supplying them. An investigation into surveillance in Central Asia conducted by Privacy International–the findings of which were recently released–raise serious questions as to how democratic progress stands a chance at all in Central Asia in the face of such a comprehensive system of political control facilitated by state surveillance. It also exposes the complexities, dangers and unaccountable nature of a private surveillance industry, and the governments and companies that facilitate their activities. 

The global surveillance industry 

There is a growing but intentionally murky and unquantifiable private industry that is selling technologies to governments to allow them to monitor individuals and society. Initially developed and traded from countries with significant ICT (information and communications technology) and security sectors, these technologies are used across the world by law enforcement and intelligence agencies to listen to phone calls, read emails, view individuals' web history, and gain a complete overview of their social connections. Some technologies allow authorities to turn on the webcam and microphone of a device.

Its growth is being driven by two factors. As more data about everyone's lives are transmitting somewhere across networks or are being stored in devices or servers, it greatly increases the intrusive and revelatory nature of surveillance and its appeal to governments and the security industry. Secondly, as networks and devices are themselves spreading and become increasingly sophisticated, authorities are seeking new and advanced solutions for accessing them.

The outcome of this growth–combined with outdated legal regimes incapable of regulating the use and sale of many of these technologies–is an unaccountable industry facilitating unaccountable surveillance practices.

Surveillance in Central Asia

In many respects–and similarly to other places across the world–the legal framework governing electronic surveillance practices in Central Asia is either inadequate, nonexistent or not in compliance with international human rights standards. A lack of transparency within the industry itself, reliant upon non-disclosure agreements, undermines any form of accountability.

This has predictable consequences. In Uzbekistan, testimonies show how human rights activists’ emails and calls are being targeted by what is believed to be their own government in an effort to monitor and silence them and their activities, in some cases having transcripts of their communications presented to them and receiving visits from security forces following phone calls. One activist, Mutabar Tadjibayeva–now based in France–details her repeated interrogation by Uzbek agents after discussing the infamous 2005 Andijan massacre over the phone. What modern surveillance techniques allow however, isn't just an insight into an individual, but that of their entire network, and of society itself.  

Understanding how authorities obtain these capabilities is key to finding potential solutions in what is a technical and complicated area. There are various technologies identified as having been sold to the region which would allow authorities to do this.

In one of the most glaring examples, two NASDAQ-listed multinationals operating out of Israel have supplied sophisticated spying technology directly to the secret police of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan. Verint Israel and NICE Systems have both supplied facilities in these countries from which agents of the SNB in Uzbekistan and KNB in Kazakhstan–the two successor agencies to the KGB–receive, request and analyse intercepted phone calls, mobiles calls and internet data. 

These monitoring centres aim to allow analysts of two agencies well documented as involved in widescale abuses of human rights access to the communications of every person living in the country. Verint Israel even attempted to facilitate the Uzbek SNB trying to crack encrypted secure web traffic such as banking and emails. The purchase of these technologies isn't simply a one-off; both companies have had surveillance related project in the countries since the early 2000s, and in addition to the technology itself, provide training, maintenance, and technical support.  

Large multinational telecommunications companies also provide Central Asian governments with surveillance capabilities because of legal mandates placed upon them in order to operate. Across Kazakhstan, for example, a series of monitoring points exist which facilitate access and interception of communications. In some cases, this architecture allows the authorities direct access to telecommunications networks without any form of oversight by judicial bodies or the telecommunications operator itself. This means that equipment and services provided by large multinational vendors and operators is being used for surveillance with their knowledge and assistance.

Need for address

The ability to communicate freely and use modern ICTs free from state surveillance is essential to ensuring economic, political, and social progress in places such as Central Asia. Ensuring that this isn't destroyed by modern surveillance techniques requires a multifaceted approach involving technological, policy-based and legal solutions.

At a minimum, it requires that international bodies and governments must not approve the export of technologies the use of which risks undermining human rights. But the private sector itself must also act. It should not be left up to governments to regulate trade; commercial actors must ensure that their activities and sales do not undermine international human rights, and that their customers data is free from arbitrary or illegal state surveillance. 

There of course exist many disincentives for this. Central Asia is not alone in having systems for electronic surveillance of communications. As the Snowden disclosures show, even liberal democracies with established systems of oversight are engaging in state surveillance on an unprecedented scale, and on a highly dubious legal footing. But 'what-about-ism' does not detract from the fact that the wrongdoing of one party does not legitimise that of another.

For too long in Central Asia, energy, economic, strategic, and security interests have meant that foreign governments have substantially ignored human rights abuses and democratisation as priority areas in the region. Indeed, many foreign interests can be guaranteed by regime stability. As terrorism and trafficking–two legitimate issues in the area–are prioritized, and as economic opportunities present themselves, the incentive for governments to allow or actively promote state surveillance capabilities will only grow.

This however would be woefully short-sighted. Effectively countering such issues is best done across the long term through democratization, ensuring representation and economic rights, good governance, and respect for human rights. Security, far from being something which needs to be balanced against these, is something that is intimately linked. Enabling authorities such as those in Central Asia with highly-revelatory surveillance capabilities will only enable political control and all but crush individual privacy–along with political and social progress. 

For the last 3 years the Kazakh government has been declaring to its people that the country's assumption of the chair of the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) in 2010 signals Kazakhstan's growing importance in the world. It will be the first of the post-Soviet states to do so.

Given the importance the government clearly attaches to this impending event, how has it been preparing to take the helm of an organisation whose objectives include ensuring ‘full respect for human rights and fundamental freedoms; to abide by the rule of law'? Have relations between the Kazakh government and the media, which have been stormy in recent years, been improving?

A review of recent developments is sobering. There was the three-year prison term served on Ramazan Yesergepov, editor-in-chief of the independent weekly Alma-Ata Info on 8 August 2009. He was arrested on 6 January 2009 by armed, masked security officers while being treated for hypertension at the Cardiology Institute in Almaty. The charge of "illegal gathering and dissemination of state secrets" stem from an article he published on 21 November 2008 entitled 'Who rules the Country - the President or the CNS?' The article is said to deal with a tax fraud allegation involving a local prosecutor and a judge. The CNS, or Committee of National Security, is Kazakhstan's KGB.

Yesergepov, who comes from the small town Taraz, was also prosecuted for the disclosure of an official letter from the head of the local CNS.  This letterincluded in article on the local wine and vodka factory and detailed actions to be taken against the management. The management claimed that these actions amounted to a hostile takeover.  Evgeny Zhovtis, director of Kazakhstan's Bureau of International Human Rights and the Rule of Law, testified that nothing in the memos supported the charge that Yesergepov had disclosed official secrets. But the testimony of the CNS proved stronger and the journalist was sent down.  The signal was clear: Yesergepov was being punished to warn others off crossing the CNS.

Next the authorities targeted Yesergepov's defender, Evgeny Zhovtis. In July Zhovtis was involved in an accident at night on a deserted road, in which a man was killed. He was given a 4-year prison sentence on 4 September. "Political considerations led the court to ignore openly the country's legislation" declared a well-known Kazakhstan journalist, Sergei Dubanov. "Evgenii Zhovtis' defence was given 40 minutes to prepare for the presentation of their case, so they refused to to present. The judge withdrew and in 30 minutes came out with a prepared verdict.  How do we know the verdict was prepared?  Because it would have been impossible to type it all up in 30 minutes". Dubanov has his own reasons for not trusting the courts. After publishing a series of articles on ‘Kazakhgate', he was himself first accused of defaming President Nursultan Nazarbayev, then of raping an underage girl.

According to Zhovtis' defence lawyer, the proceedings were so full of procedural infringements that "it's hard to see it as anything but a farce and political reprisal against a public activist well-known both inside and outside the country". For the last 20 years Zhovtis has indeed been a leading opponent of the illegal actions of the regime. He has led the chorus of those insisting that Kazakhstan must comply with the standards of the OSCE if it is going to take the chair.

Zhovtis also chairs a foundation called Bota, a post to which he was nominated because of his impeccable reputation in Kazakhstan and beyond. The foundation was entrusted with distributing $84 mln which the US government confiscated in 1999, because it suspected that it had been criminally acquired.  Only after trying unsuccessfully to get its hands on the money did the Kazakh government finally admit that its provenance was criminal. 

The foundation was about to start disbursing these funds for educational purposes and to help poor families. Conveniently, Zhovtis's imprisonment also serves to paralyse the charity just as it was due to start operating. The selection of another president will take some time.

The relationship between the newspaper Respublikaand the Kazakh government has never been an easy one.  When it opened in 2000, the staff were greeted at the door with funeral wreaths, sent by ‘admirers', plus the severed head of a dog with the note saying ‘You're next'.

Since then there has been an arsonattempt and a string of court cases. The latest was brought by the BTA Bank, which claimed that an article in Respublika had prompted customers to withdraw $40 mln from the bank. The plaintiffs could furnish no proof that the withdrawals were a response to the article, or even that they had happened after its publication.  But the paper lost the case and was ordered to pay $500,000 in compensation. On 18 September, when the court ruling took effect, the paper's print run was seized, as were the bank accounts of its owner and its publisher. 

The chair of Respublika's editorial board, Irina Petrushova, maintains that the bank brought the case at the behest of a 'higher body', in order to close the paper down.  The period for appealing the court decision ran out on 24 September and on that day the print run was seized. Hürriyet Daily News reported  Respublika  as saying:.  "Despite this technical censorship, we continue to work. The newspaper is coming out and in just the same way as before."

Since April, the independent the newspaper's internet site http://www.respublika.kz/ and another online news outlet http://www.zona.kz/ have also been repeatedly subjected to hacking and cyber attacks, some on a scale requiring tens of thousands of linked computers. No such attacks have been sustained by government-controlled websites.

On the legislative front, a new law has also been passed recently which subjects all material on the internet- from online shops to blogs - to the same constraints as the media.  Now a new media law is on the way. One of the most dangerous of the Ministry of the Interior's proposals is that journalists should be held responsible for ‘disseminating slanderous information on the private lives of individuals'.  This would effectively prevent the media from reporting anything about the amoral behaviour or abuses of power of public figures.

The closer the Kazakh government gets to assuming the chair of the OSCE, the more determined it seems to be to show that it can do without even the pretence of abiding by the rule of law.

On 4 July Russian TV aired a documentary about Belarus president Alexander Lukashenko. It was a programme that soon sent shockwaves around media and political circles. The programme itself was nothing special and the facts it revealed were hardly unfamiliar to people who follow politics. Its resonance had everything to do with timing and context, preceding as it did an agreement on Customs Union between Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, which was due to be signed in Astana, Kazakhstan the very next day.

The documentary’s title — “Krestny Batka” (“The Nation’s Godfather”) — dropped some obvious hints. Few educated readers could have failed to make the connection between “Batka” (“father of the nation”, a title Lukashenko openly enjoys) and Francis Ford Coppola’s cinematic masterpiece. The documentary itself matched the opening hints, presenting the leader of Belarus (considered by many Russians to be a brotherly nation) as a tyrant and criminal. He was, according to the programme, someone who not only crushes democratic opposition, but also liquidates political rivals with the assistance of professional killers from the secret services. Anyone who watched “Krestny Batka” could only have reached one conclusion: Lukashenko’s uninterrupted position as president since 1994 was the result of a blatant and systematic infringement of democratic norms

NTV's Lukashenko documentary (trailer in Russian)

Viewers of another revelatory film about Lukashenko, shown the same evening on the English-language channel “Russia Today” (a propaganda weapon of the Kremlin) were no doubt expected to come to a similar conclusion.

By interesting contrast, the next day Russian Channel One broadcast another documentary, this time about Kazakhstan president Nursultan Nazarbaev. Nazarbaev has been president for even longer than Lukashenko, and is just as relaxed about adjusting democratic norms in order to stay in power. Yet this programme chose to show Nazarbaev in an exclusively positive light: as a wise person, a worthy ruler and wonderful family man.

There can be no coincidence to the fact that these three films were shown at the same time, just before the summit in Astana. If we were to borrow a phrase from Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Treasure Island”, it would seem that through its actions, the Kremlin was sending Lukashenko a “black spot”: a symbol depicting his impending death. While in our case, we can only be talking in the metaphorical sense, it would certainly appear that the Kremlin has to all extents signed off on the Belarussian president as a politician they can do business with.

To understand why, we must first look at the background to the Customs Union.

Customs Union or Customs Anschluss?

Russia has, since the collapse of the USSR in 1991, undertaken various efforts aimed at restoring cooperation between post-Soviet nations. Initially, the CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) was created for this purpose. Many actually believed that this Commonwealth would go some way to replacing the USSR. In fact, it was a complete sham. The Baltic States (Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania) did not join the CIS at all, preferring to move towards joining the European Union. Some member countries had openly hostile relations with each other, for example Armenia and Azerbaijan, later Russia and Georgia (which left the CIS following the August 2008 War).

Another attempt to restore cooperation in the post-Soviet area lay in the formation of a Union State of Russia and Belarus. No unified state was actually ever created, but for a long time Lukashenko used declarations about the intention to create one as a way of gaining economic favours from Moscow.

Unlike the CIS and the Union State, the Customs Union appears a real and potentially quite useful innovation. Removing customs barriers between the three nations could help foster competition and a regional market economy. The signing of the agreement in Astana is perhaps the first real success story of economic integration for some two decades. That does not mean we should overestimate its significance. While political leaders and the official media often talk a great deal about it, society and the independent press do not share their enthusiasm.

There are at least two reasons for this.

The first is the unequal economic weight of the members of the union. Russia’s GDP, for example, is more than 12 times higher than that of Kazakhstan (and more than 25 times higher than that of Belarus). Even by population, Russia is almost 10 times larger than Kazakhstan and more than 15 times larger than Belarus. So, for all the theoretical significance of the Customs Union, in practical terms little will change (at least not for Russia). What will happen is not so much unification of three markets, rather that the Russian market will simply become somewhat stronger.

Certainly, there is very little to compare the formation of Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan with the development of the European Economic Community, which was the foundation of the present European Union. It would seem to have more in common with the Customs Union of the 1830s, formed by Prussia in German lands. Here, one large nation signed a number of small nations into its economic orbit. In Germany at the time, there was talk of a customs “Anschluss” (annexation).  We could with some reason use same term today to describe the relations between Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus (the analogy is also useful for newspaper editors since, in Russian, the word for union – “soyuz”­ – and “Anschluss” rhyme).

A second reason not to overestimate the significance of the Customs Union is in many ways the opposite point to the one we have made. The political leaders and national elites of Kazakhstan and Belarus are prepared to receive economic advantages from the unification, but they object with all their might to subordinating their countries to Russia. The political stand-off between the Kremlin and Lukashenko has, in particular, become extremely serious of late.  This forms the background to “Krestny Batka”.

The disobedient Batka

In the most part, conflicts between the Kremlin and Russia stem from the fact Russia has essentially for some time been subsidizing the Belarussian economy; and has also for some time expected certain favours in exchange for this. What exactly these favours are is difficult to say. Political bargaining between Russia and Belarus has never been carried out in the open. But we can suppose “Belarussian services” to the Kremlin might fall into one of two categories:

The first category is political services. On the one hand, Belarus is not an overly influential political force, and cannot therefore offer Russia significant support on important issues. On the other hand, Lukashenko himself claimed he had, for example, been asked to officially recognise Abkhazia and South Ossetia as independent nations. There are reasons to believe him. Russia was clearly embarrassed over the (lack of) international recognition of these two republics, supported at the time only by Venezuela, Nicaragua and Nauru (which only underlined the isolation of Moscow in world opinion). Lukashenko did not oblige the Kremlin on this occasion

Of course, we cannot be sure if Moscow really asked Lukashenko to recognise Abhazia and South Ossetia. It is also possible that Belarussian president made it all up in order to demonstrate to the West his tenacity in a supposed battle with Russia’s imperial ambitions. But we may confidently assume that, in principle, Moscow would much prefer to subsidise a country that is ready to toe the line when it comes to delicate issues of this kind.

The second category of services is economic in nature. The Russian state and dependent companies would clearly benefit greatly from privileged access to privatization tenders. Of particular interest are Belarus’ Europe-destined gas and oil pipelines, as well as Soviet-era oil-processing factories. Lukashenko has not, however, been prepared to grant Russia the conditions it seeks. Russia would particularly like to increase its influence over the Belarusian gas transit company Beltransgaz, for example (Gazprom already owns 50%).

Lukashenko is also constantly engaged in political manoeuvres. He sometimes pretends to make compromises to the Kremlin, but in reality limits himself to minimal, extracted concessions. The Belarussian president does not want to share his power with the rulers from Moscow.

It seems that, at last, the Kremlin has grown tired of such manoeuvres.

A month ago, Gazprom dramatically reduced the supply of gas to Belarus, demanding that Lukashenko pay off debts it claimed were owed. Now, with the help of a television film, a blow has been dealt not to Belarus as a whole, but to the president of this country, and very personally. Judging by the power of this blow, one could surmise that Moscow wants to bring Lukashenko to his knees. Perhaps, even, it is trying to remove him from his presidential post (the next presidential elections are due to be held in Belarus next year).

How firm is Lukashenko’s position, then?

On the one hand, Lukashenko is undoubtedly trapped in a corner. He still has no money to pay for fuel, as the Belarussian economy is in a poor state. Moscow may also turn off the gas again right before elections, and thus undermine “Batka’s” popularity. Since the “last dictator in Europe” has such a bad reputation in the West, there is little likelihood he will receive financial support from the EU.

On the other hand, the mechanisms for removing Lukashenko are not immediately clear. When the Kremlin quarreled with former president Viktor Yushchenko, for example, it simply began bankrolling the political opposition in the person of Viktor Yanukovich. In Belarus, owing to Lukashenko’s authoritarian methods of rule, there is simply no opposition outlet able to command the support of a significant section of the population.

Moreover, while it might well be possible to remove Lukashenko — he has, after all, quarreled with the entire world with the exception Hugh Chavez — creating a stable democratic regime in Belarus will surely prove more difficult. Belarus is no Kyrgyzstan, but recent events there have aptly demonstrated how the departure of an authoritarian leader combined with the absence of strong government can create serious problems.

There can’t be many places worthy of the epithet ‘former seaside town’. Indeed, Moynaq, now miles from any water, hasn’t moved an inch. What has happened is the shoreline has simply receded by 40 km. Along with Aralsk, Kazalinsk, Uchsai and Bugun, the only reminder of the sea is in the ubiquitous remains of the good old days: the beached boats, the rotting tackle and the eerie placards hailing the goodness of water and the importance of fishing to the Soviet economy.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Once a thriving seaside resort, Moynaq now only attracts tourism of a morbid nature. Photograph (cc) Giladr

Once Moynaq was more than just economically prosperous.

It was a famous holiday resort, the Crimea of Central Asia. In summer, several flights a day brought Soviet citizens to the beach. At the time, writer Viktor Vitkovich described the Aral Sea as ‘exceedingly pure, as deep and delicate as aquamarine, but without the touch of green, as intense and bright as Badakhshan azurite, and as translucent as sapphire’. The entire town lived and worked with the sea and its related industries, packing and canning. Without the sea, the town was as good as dead, and I did wonder how a town with no means of livelihood and almost 100 per cent unemployment could be anything other than that. The only vague hope for Moynaq was tourism, but even that wasn’t exactly the healthy kind.

‘May I ask,’ enquired the driver, ‘what are you doing in Moynaq?’

‘Business,’ said Bohodir.

‘Oh,’ he said, knowing full well there was no business in Moynaq.

Bohodir and I found a yellow Moskvich at the Qongirat taxi rank. The engine growled, then died. A sigh, a clatter of instruments, and soon we were gliding through cotton flats and scrub.

‘May I ask,’ enquired the driver, ‘what are you doing in Moynaq?’

‘Business,’ said Bohodir.

‘Oh,’ he said, knowing full well there was no business in Moynaq.

As we drove along the cotton petered out and the farmed flats turned to wasteland. The salt patches weren’t so prevalent here. These were cotton plantations, desperately watered, leached and watered again and the air was humid with evaporation. On the approach to Moynaq we spotted some artificial lakes, great dug-out bowls that had been filled with imported water and fish to give the fishermen something to do. It was a stab at rescuing Moynaq, but it wasn’t enough.

At last the sign came: ARAL KHOSH KELDINIZ (WELCOME TO ARAL). This was the part I’d been waiting for. We’d scarcely glanced at the town before the taxi driver had skidded off with a spray of sand. There were no customers in Moynaq. Bohodir and I stood together in the main street. As we hoisted up our bags, we noticed the deathly quiet. There was just no one around, no cars, no sound. It was like a Sunday afternoon in mid­summer, when everyone should be away – but holidays were a luxury no one could afford. Everyone was still here. So where were they? The wind swirled the sand and the odd bit of metal clacked, increasing the silence. But there was no birdsong. The road ran straight ahead between two rows of run-down housing, the tarmac obscured by drifts of sand that crept silently.

Bohodir and I started the trudge to the hotel, passing one or two bent-backed women with babies.

‘Where are the men?’ I asked him.

‘In Kazakhstan, mostly,’ he said. ‘They send money home. Keeps Moynaq alive. Same in Qongirat.’

The population of (supposedly) 9,000 had been whittled down to a few mothers and children. The only men I could see were a crowd of puffy-faced drinkers at the taxi rank.

It felt like walking through a film set: a broken tractor on its side, a train carriage rotting on the street, miles from its track, bleached skiffs parked on the pavement, their wood split and tackle rotten. I recalled that Morrissey lyric, ‘This is the coastal town. That they forgot to close down . . . Come, Armageddon! Come!’

Most astonishing were the placards. These were a fixture of Central Asia, it seemed. All of Karakalpakstan was hung with signs, messages from Karimov, pearls of wisdom on nation­hood, happiness and unity, as if only the father of the nation knew the answer. This was an enduring legacy of the Soviet era, and it was patriarchal and patronising at the best of times. But here, in the context of what had happened, it was unbelievable. Every few metres hung another placard. Bohodir translated as we passed: ‘WATER IS THE SOURCE OF LIFE’, ‘LABOUR LEADS TO JOY’, ‘MOTHER’S HAPPINESS IS PEOPLE’S HAPPINESS’, ‘FISH OUR WEALTH’. Why no one had torn them down I never understood.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The Moynaq canning factory was once a mainstay of the region’s economy. By 1986, ecological changes had taken their toll on the region and fish had to be shuttled in by desperate Soviet officials from thousands of miles away. Photo (cc) Martijn Munneke

Finally, we passed the canning factory, the city’s pride and one-time mainstay of the economy. We poked our noses through the chicken wire and saw inside a mess of rusted machinery and broken glass. The security guards shooed us away in sharp bursts of Karakalpak. But what were they protecting? The last native Aral fish had died in 1986, drowned by the noxious waves.

By 1986, 50 years of the Mengele school of ecology had taken their toll. New fish were shuttled in, but they too died. Moscow panicked. They had to keep the canners canning, whatever the cost. Fish caught in the Caspian and Baltic were hauled thousands of miles to remote Karakalpakstan just to keep the factory open. This was clearly unsustainable. Wild schemes were hatched to replenish the sea. One idea, the Sibaral Project, was as mad as it was expensive. The plan was to take the Ob and Irtysh, two massive Siberian rivers that flowed north into the Arctic, then dam, reverse and direct them south into the Aral Sea. If this were successful, cotton wealth could be enjoyed in perpetuity.

In Soviet times, wild schemes were hatched to replenish the sea. One idea was to reverse the Ob and Irtysh, two massive Siberian rivers that flowed north into the Arctic, and direct them south into the Aral Sea.

Orpheus was said to have piped so beautifully that he could change the direction of the River Styx. But by now the USSR could barely feed itself, let alone turn back nature. Even in the Forties, Viktor Vitkovich refers to the idea in his book. ‘If the plan goes ahead,’ he writes, ‘Central Asia would then have so much water that it could wipe the desert off the map for good.’ Thankfully, Siberia was spared this assault by massive popular criticism and lack of funds, so nothing was done. The canning factory closed, the fishermen hauled in their boats and the Aral Sea was sententiously proclaimed to be ‘Nature’s error’. When the damage was deemed irreversible the authorities cried, ‘Let it die a beautiful death.’

At last we arrived at the hotel. On the edge of the town, where the low buildings seemed to disappear into the scrub, stood a small, white-washed building decked in lush, trellised verdure. A tubby man in a string vest and flip-flops was splashing the greenery liberally with a hose. Heaven only knew where the water was coming from. He greeted us with a smile and led us through the lobby – walls stencilled with rowing boats and fish. Bohodir and I, both uncomfortable at this wanton display of plenty, walked up to the desk, where a pair of German travellers were waiting. They were in their mid-thirties, urban types with stylish haircuts and hemp bags. Anywhere else in the world we might have struck up a rapport, formed a temporary friendship built around our experiences. But not here. There was something each of us recognised in the other: a morbid curiosity in the disaster that was taking place. We confined ourselves to a nod.

As Bohodir and I were led upstairs, we peered from the staircase window to see a scrap-metal dump, a horizon of creeping scrub, and barefoot children making mud pies among the mess. The hotelier beckoned me to follow, loping around in his boxer shorts and vest. He was probably the richest man in Moynaq. Two or three guests a week and he was probably tied over until winter, when the place turned into a gulag.

Bohodir knocked at my door at eight.

‘You will need sunglasses, sunblock and a hat,’ he said.

I noticed he had none of the above, as we set off to the beach. The sun screamed down now and steppe winds were blowing sand in all directions.

‘Cover your eyes,’ called Bohodir, ‘don’t get the dust in your eyes.’ He was right. The yellowy soil wasn’t natural. It was infested with DDT and anthrax. We marched against the wind for a while, pushing against a flat and scrubby horizon. We weren’t far now. The sky was scraped an awesome blue by the scouring winds. A jogger panted past, with sweatbands and a visor. We stopped him, half to check if he was real, half to ask where the ‘ships’ graveyard’ was. The ships’ graveyard was the lodestar of Karakalpakstan, the point of visiting Moynaq: an eerie assemblage of beached boats on the dry seabed.

‘No more ships,’ he said, jogging on the spot. ‘They’ve taken them away. Don’t bother,’ and jogged off. I also wanted to ask him what he was doing exercising by a toxic seabed. It was like going to Chernobyl to ‘take the waters’, but he’d already vanished.

Soon, on the right, a finger of concrete appeared, an obelisk to the Karakalpak contribution to the Great Patriotic War.

And there in all its horrific majesty was the great Ok Kum, the White Sand Desert formerly known as the Aral Sea, a clumpy seabed that seemed to stretch forever. There were thickets and tough bushes that could probably survive in a post­-nuclear world. Here and there were scattered the detritus of a huge maritime industry, engine cast-offs, bolts and rowing boats like bath toys on the horizon.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.The area that was once known as the Aral Sea is now called the Great Ok Kum Desert, Photo (cc) Martijn Munneke

We scrambled down the scree on to the dry bed to feel it under our feet. It felt hard and brown, pitching in small troughs, and disconcertingly moist underneath. Bohodir shoved a twig into a hard, glazed hummock. A gelatinous ooze slithered out like crème caramel.

It seemed the jogger was right, the tugs and trawlers really had been taken away. From where I stood, there were only the indentations of their hulls on the mud, as if some warm, full-bellied beasts had sloped off to die. I felt cheated of my prize. I stood on a bluff and looked into the distance. A shepherd was towing a line of cattle across the seabed. Their coats were matted and their udders deeply sagged. This toxic soil served as their daily pasture. I began to feel sick.

Far out of view, in the middle of the sea, was the island of Vozrozhdenie, or Resurrection. Karakalpaks had always been wary of it, and folklore claimed that an enchanted castle stood there, surrounded by flaming quicksand. They were half-right. The castle was a major Soviet bio-weapons plant called Aralsk 7, built in 1954 to study the dissemination patterns of biological weapons. Unluckily, the prevailing winds blew south to Karakalpakstan, carrying a cloud of toxins: anthrax, tularemia, brucellosis, plague, typhus and smallpox. The plant was abandoned in 1991, leaving the live anthrax spores to fester until in 2002, when the US Pentagon, fearing the use of this anthrax-laden soil by terrorists, sent the Threat Reduction Agency to decontaminate the anthrax dumps. Which they did, leaving the rest of the site untouched. Today any visit without full body protection would be tantamount to suicide.

As Bohodir and I eased out of Moynaq that afternoon, we spotted a man by the road. He had tattoos on his thin white arms. We offered him a lift as far as Qongirat. His name was Roger and he was an American Peace Corps worker. On the ride back he told us that he’d illegally put a group together to work with schoolchildren over the summer. President Karimov wanted NGOs as far away from Moynaq as possible, said Roger. He didn’t want foreigners to see how little was being done.

‘See,’ he told us in his deep Virginia drawl, ‘the official population here is nine thousand. But the real population is more like two. A lot of people think that Karimov is just watching and waiting for the last of the Karakalpaks to die off or disappear into Kazakhstan so it can then be repopulated by “ethnic” Uzbeks who will then make use of the mineral wealth lying under the ground. This is the rumour. But it doesn’t matter whether you believe it or not, because they’re already drilling for oil on the seabed. That wealth is not for Karakalpaks.’

Roger, a doctor by training, despite his unhealthy pallor, was a passionate activist. But there was something hard in his voice, a protective shell he’d developed after staying too long out here.

‘I don’t believe the republic will survive in the long run,’ he continued. ‘Perhaps another twenty, thirty years. They’re going already. They’ll go even quicker if HIV takes off. It’s a known fact that areas of high emigration, drugs, alcoholism and hepatitis like this are just waiting for an AIDS explosion. That should just about kill off whoever’s left.’

Roger got off at Qongirat without much of a goodbye and we carried on to Nukus. I tried to think what I’d gained by seeing all this. My desire to witness a dying society had been fulfilled. I’d observed the drawn-out suffering of a people without the resources to change their fate. Bohodir, who’d understood every word Roger had told us, sat watching the horizon without expression.

The midday heat had passed now, leaving the salt flats rippling to the horizon. The knots of telephone wires thinned into a line that pitched and fell by the side of the road, the plains opened and I stared, blankly, into the distance.

Few Karakalpaks I met – not even Bohodir, who was educated – showed any nostalgia for their historic nomadic days. That time was gone, and its significance lost. Today they mourned the Aral disaster and the losses that came in its wake – their livelihoods, pensions, factory jobs, farm jobs, office jobs, all of which vanished with the collapse of the Soviet Union.

But I couldn’t help feeling sadness at the end of the nomadic way of life, and the loss of the deep understanding of the natural environment once possessed by the now-settled Turkic peoples. There was a wealth of ancestral knowledge that the steppe-dwelling peoples could have taught the USSR, but they were never given the chance. ‘Only by turning to their way of living can we make our way out of the bogs in which we vainly stumble,’ said Ella Maillart. But it was already too late. Today’s Karakalpaks watched the steppe as uncomprehendingly as I did.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.Taken from ‘Out of Steppe’ by Daniel Metcalfe. Published by Arrow at £8.99. Copyright © Daniel Metcalfe 2009. http://www.rbooks.co.uk/product.aspx?id=0099524996

When Mikhail Gorbachev introduced the policy of Glasnost across all Soviet government institutions in the late 1980s, it marked the beginning of the end for the Soviet Empire. What the policy meant was that for the first time, the press would be able to disseminate uncensored information without fear of reprisal.  The details of Stalin’s purges could be published for the first time; the previously hidden detail of endemic social problems could be printed in newspapers; and debates could be had and ideas shared with the Western world – legally. Gorbachev had pulled back the Iron Curtain and, if only momentarily, the Soviet Empire got its first authorised glimpse of democracy.

But 19 years have passed since the end of Gorbachev’s short tenure as President of the Soviet Union, and unfortunately the spirit of Glasnost does not live on. Today it is estimated that nearly 80 per cent of those living in the former Soviet Union still live under authoritarian regimes that deprive them of fundamental political rights and civil liberties. Tightly controlled news media, pliant courts and brutal security forces are prevalent characteristics. The last ten years in particular, according to an extensive survey by Freedom House, have constituted “a decade of democratic regression in the former Soviet Union”.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Nowhere is this more apparent than within the borders of Kazakhstan – where dissenters, journalists and human rights activists have been frequently and consistently repressed with zeal. Nursultan Nazarbayev, Kazakhstan’s 70-year old president, is one of only two leaders in the former USSR who also held power during the days of communist rule.  Nazarbayev presents himself as a man of democracy, often asserting his commitment to the “protection and promotion of human rights and fundamental freedoms”. In reality, however, he is a dictator committed more so than anything else to the protection and maintenance of his own power.

Glasnost, therefore, is far from the agenda in Kazakhstan. According to Human Rights Watch, independent journalists who criticize Nazarbayev’s government face threats, harassment and “antiquated” penalties for civil defamation and libel. This year alone, no fewer than two independent newspapers have been shut under Kazakh government pressure, while examples of press repression are reported almost weekly by Almaty-based media monitoring group Adil Soz, reflecting the country’s position as 162 out of 178 in Reporters Without Borders’ Press Freedom Index.

One newspaper in particular, Respublika, has faced repeated and well-documented harassment from the Kazakh government.  In 2002, after having supported an oppositional political party (Democratic Choice of Kazakhstan), reporters from Respublika turned up to work to find the corpse of a decapitated dog outside their offices. Next to the dog was a note that read, simply, “This is the last warning”. The following day, their offices were burned down.

But Republika refused to be intimidated and continued to publish, often under a different name in order to evade the authorities. Banned from the printing presses, and faced with a $400,000 fine in 2009 for publishing an opinion piece critical of the government owned bank BTA, the paper is now self-published by dedicated staff using office equipment, maintaining a circulation of 19,000. They have also adopted social media such as Facebook and Twitter to get their stories out.  But their website, which once reached approximately 33,000 people per week (a substantial figure given that approximately only 34.3% of Kazakhstanis have access to the internet), has been blocked internally by the government.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Kazakhstan's new capital Astana will show OSCE
leaders its glitz and glamour. 

“We had a high readership and people were discussing things, sharing ideas and trying to take action…that was the reason they blocked us,” said Respublika reporter Yevgeniya Plakhina.  “If our government doesn’t like the content, they just block it."

Despite continuing to employ such draconian censorship measures, Kazakhstan has over the course of 2010 chaired the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) – a 56 member intergovernmental organisation whose mandate includes a major commitment to “addressing and providing early warning on violations of freedom of expression.”

“It’s beyond ironic,” said Rachel Denber, acting Executive Director of Human Rights Watch’s Europe and Central Asia Division. “I think that there were real questions about Kazakhstan’s suitability as the chair of the organisation because of its deeply flawed human rights record. No country is perfect, but Kazakhstan really needed to do more before it had the chairmanship.”

It was felt by some, though, that giving Kazakhstan the opportunity to chair the OSCE would force the government to push through reforms. This was undoubtedly based upon a willingness to give the country’s leadership the benefit of the doubt. After all, when Kazakhstan made its initial bid for the chairmanship in 2007, then Foreign Minister Marat Tazhin had pledged at the OSCE Ministerial Council in Madrid that Kazakhstan would bring its media laws up to international standards. “We are going to incorporate various proposals into a consolidated bill to amend the Media Law,” he said at the time. Yet three years on, the pledge rings hollow.

“Tazhin promised in Madrid that we would stick to democratic laws,” said Plakhina. “But when Kazakhstan was chosen to chair the OSCE nothing actually changed. It got even worse… several newspapers were closed as a result of defamation lawsuits.”

Part of the problem, Plakhina believes, is Kazakhstan’s geographical location. The country is a corridor to Afghanistan and a key ally of coalition forces in the War on Terror. It is also home to the Caspian Sea, which contains oil estimated to be worth in the region of $12 trillion.

“We have oil, we have gas, we have other resources,” Plakhina says. “I think our rights and freedoms are traded for resources, traded for other political advantages that OSCE member countries are taking from us.  Few of the OSCE members criticise Kazakhstan. That’s what really disappoints me.”

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

70-year-old president Nursultan Nazarbayev, who has
led the country since before independence in 1991.

Later this week, Kazakhstan will end its one year term as chair of the OSCE by hosting the annual OSCE summit, on December 1 and 2.  International security is set to form the dominant part of the programme, but human rights and media freedom issues will also feature. Human Rights Watch will present a statement at the summit that will “urge the OSCE to prevail on participating states to uphold their commitments to freedom of expression across the board,” and the British delegation – led by Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg – will also raise human rights concerns.

“We continue to be concerned about freedoms of religion, expression, assembly and of the media [in Kazakhstan],” said a spokesperson for the UK Foreign and Commonwealth Office, who also praised the country for taking steps with its reform agenda. “We and international partners will continue to encourage the Kazakh authorities  both bilaterally and through key international organisations such as the EU and OSCE, to press ahead with reforms, many of which they themselves have identified as necessary."

 This will offer little reassurance for Plakhina and her colleagues at Respublika, though. For them there remains a sense of anxiety about what will happen when Kazakhstan steps back from the international scrutiny inevitably attached to the chairmanship of the OSCE. The newspaper, for instance, recently received an anonymous email informing them that after the summit they would be closed down once and for all.

“After the summit you will hear about a lot of bad things going on in Kazakhstan,“ Plakhina says. “We won’t any longer have to hide our human rights violations… things are going to take a turn for the worse. We are trying to increase awareness in European countries about what is going to happen, but there is not much hope. As long as Nazarbayev is president, nothing is going to change.”

What lessons can we learn from the presidential election recently held in Turkmenistan? Apparently none if we focus on the domestic implications, with Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov re-elected as president with a landslide 97% of the vote. The Berdymuhamedov regime has now completed the process of consolidating its power; it can now be expected to focus on re-personalising Turkmen politics, filling the void left after the death of long-time dictator Saparmurat Niyazov in 2006. Certainly the campaign to create a cult of Berdymuhamedov’s personality is well under way.

Analysing Berdymuhamedov’s re-election from a regional perspective stimulates some interesting questions about the current trajectory of Central Asia’s post-Soviet political evolution. The vote of 12 February made a mockery of the institution of elections and this is a trend that has characterised Central Asian politics in recent years. Two of the three recent presidential elections in the region – Turkmenistan’s in February and Kazakhstan’s snap election held in April 2011 – have seen incumbents re-elected as a result of machinations from within the ruling regimes rather than an expression of popular will. In both cases there has been a high degree of regime interference in the electoral campaigns and many irregularities in the voting procedures.

On the other hand, the third electoral contest held in Central Asia in the last 12 months – in Kyrgyzstan in October 2011 – constituted the first smooth presidential transition to have ever occurred in Central Asia since the collapse of the Soviet Union. In an unprecedented decision, Roza Otunbaeva decided not to run for the presidential post, opening the field to ‘fresh’ candidates.

In the context of the transmission of power according to constitutional provisions, the Turkmen election represents an interesting element in Central Asian developments – obviously, for all the wrong reasons. The Turkmen vote constitutes yet another episode in the peculiar intersection between elections and authoritarianism that has so profoundly characterised the politics of Central Asia in the last 20 years. It crystallises authoritarianism as the rule to which Central Asian governance seems to conform. Finally, it consolidates the regional praxis that supports the hegemony of incumbent leaders.

Image may be NSFW.
Clik here to view.

Men on a mission. Presidents (L-R) Nursultan Nazarbaev of Kazakhstan, Gurbanguly Berdymuhamedov of Turkmenistan and Islam Karimov of Uzbekistan all appear to be pursuing lifelong reigns. None has a succession plan in place.

This latter point represents a critical element in the politics of Central Asia – one that in turn raises questions about the future stability of the region. As a rule, Central Asian leaders pursue monopolistic power and tend to stay in power for long periods of time. These factors underpin the political experience of the last two decades, during which regimes have failed to put in place practices for succession.

To date, three out of the five Central Asian states have experienced top-level leadership change since the achievement of independence. Turkmenistan’s power transition of 2006-2007 was initiated by the natural death of Niyazov, which set into motion a process of intra-elite struggle that ultimately saw Berdymuhamedov as its victor. Transitions in Tajikistan and Kyrgyzstan were somewhat more traumatic. While a civil war led to the accession to absolute power of Emomali Rahmon (Tajikistan), popular unrest was behind the fall of the two successive Kyrgyz regimes, headed by Askar Akaev (2005) and Kurmanbek Bakiev (2010). In this sense, the election of Almazbek Atambaev to the Presidency of the Kyrgyz Republic is Central Asia’s only power transition occurred in adherence to constitutional dictates. The recent Kyrgyz case is therefore the exception to the norm: elsewhere the transfer of power has been determined by overt or covert competition amongst members of the regime, relatively violent episodes of popular unrest and even direct military hostilities.

If leadership change is an indicator of regime insecurity, then Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan are Central Asia’s most stable political systems: Nursultan Nazarbaev and Islam Karimov have retained power ever since 1991. Similarly Tajikistan’s president appears to be in a relatively stable position: Rahmon has been in office since 1994, while he was Prime Minister from 1992 to 94. While it is too early to make any assessment of the nature of Atambaev’s regime in Kyrgyzstan, the Turkmen election has confirmed Berdymuhamedov’s plans to establish long-term rule, continuing Niyazov’s way.

'Central Asia’s cultural tendency towards dynasticism appears to be secondary to the personalism that characterises post-Soviet power in the region.'

Interestingly, none of Central Asia’s current leaders has made plans for succession. While this understandable for the relatively young Berdymuhamedov (b.1957) and Rahmon (b.1952), it is puzzling that the older leaders – Nazarbaev (b.1940) and Karimov (b.1938) – have chosen not to publicly endorse a successor. Here Central Asia’s cultural tendency towards dynasticism appears to be secondary to the personalism that characterises post-Soviet power in the region. Paradoxicallly, therefore, in this sense the Kazakh and Uzbek regimes look perhaps the least durable, as it is not clear that they will outlast their current leader.

Indeed, Central Asian leaders appear to overstep the mark in terms of wielding power, monopolising it to an extent that militates against nurturing successors. This was certainly the case in pre-2006 Turkmenistan, where Niyazov’s options for intra-elite succession were reduced by the President’s paranoid distrust of his political associates, while dynastic succession was limited by his estrangement from his own family.

Similarly, dynasticism appears not to be an option for Nazarbaev and Karimov, as both leaders do not have a direct male heir in their current family ranks (although Karimov has a son from his first marriage). Although the presidents’ daughters – Dariga, Dinara and Aliya Nazarbaeva; Gulnara and Lola Karimova – are recognisable figures in their countries (yet not necessarily popular), it seems unlikely that they could become frontrunners in a top-level power transition. If Gulnara Karimova was once thought to be in a privileged position to succeed to her father, her chances have significantly decreased after 2010, when questions surrounding her business interests circulated.

Meanwhile succession based on family ties has been widely anticipated in Kazakhstan. At different times, Rakhat Aliyev – Dariga’s ex-husband – and Timur Kulibaev – Dinara’s current spouse – were presented by Kazakhstan-watchers as Nursultan Nazarbaev’s potential heirs. Interestingly, they have both now fallen out of favour with Nazarbaev: while former Deputy Foreign Minister Aliyev has now become a staunch (and very vocal) opponent to his former father-in-law, Kulibaev was recently dismissed from his post as head of Samruk-Qazyn, Kazakhstan’s Sovereign Fund.

In spite of their reluctance to nominate a successor, both Nazarbaev and Karimov have begun to deal more publicly with the limitations that age is inevitably imposing on their power. In an official visit to Germany in early February 2012, Nazarbaev answered several questions from German journalists about the state of his health. The president’s openness on the subject contrasts with his government’s reticence over rumours of prostatic surgery Nazarbaev reportedly underwent in July 2011.

Karimov, on the other hand, dealt indirectly but publicly with his own mortality in a major parliamentary speech in December 2010, when he outlined a new succession procedure to be applied in the event of his death of incapacitation. Presidential concerns with age are also thought to underpin the recent (December 2011) decision to shorten the Uzbek presidential term from seven to five years. This decision may bring about a presidential election as early as this year. Some observers have commented that the aim of the current, shorter term may be to identify a successor – current Prime Minister Shavkat Mirziyaev appears to be the front runner – and negotiate an exit strategy, ensuring that Karimov and his family can step away without fear of violent or punative retribution. Another possible explanation for the shorter term is that it could simply be another subterfuge, aimed at prolonging his time at the helm.

Whatever decision Karimov reaches on the scope of his next mandate and whatever course Nazarbaev’s health takes, political succession in Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan is no longer a matter for another day: it now represents the impending reality of a not-so-distant future. The stability of the two major political systems therefore appears at risk, as neither leadership has made arrangements to face the tasks posed by the departure of long-term leaders. If Nazarbaev and Karimov do not reverse this trend by placing the issue of succession at the centre of their remaining time in power, Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan will find themselves immersed in the same uncertainty that surrounded Turkmenistan following the death of Niyazov.

Although pre-arranged succession measures do not guarantee regime security against the emergence of instability, the Central Asian experience tells us that the lack of succession arrangements can result either in widespread instability or in the perpetuation of authoritarian practices, a situation that ultimately puts the local population between a rock and a hard place. This is exactly the scenario the citizens of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan want to avoid when their leaders exit the stage.

Over most of the past twenty years Kazakhstan has been a beacon of peace and security in Central Asia. Recently, however, internal unease and unrest appear to have increased. Several incidents are symptomatic of the situation:

--   On 16th December last year, security forces fired on unarmed striking oil workers and other people in the western city of Zhanaozen, killing and wounding a large number. The workers had been on strike for nearly eight months.

--   On 18th April, after a trial behind closed doors, forty-seven men were sentenced to prison terms for alleged terrorism in the western city of Atyrau.

--   On 19th April, a courageous independent journalist in western Kazakhstan, Lukpan Akhmedyarov, was stabbed and shot with a pneumatic pistol. He had gained prominence for reporting on abuses of government power. On 27th , despite being seriously wounded, Akhmedyarov was put on trial for allegedly "wounding the dignity and honour" of an provincial official.

'These incidents suggest that politics and governance in Kazakhstan are fraying at the edges. The legitimacy of the current political system and leadership may be ebbing. Political life is insufficiently open and resilient to absorb conflicting pressures.'

--   On 28th May, fourteen border guards and a park ranger were killed at a remote outpost on the Kazakhstani-Chinese border. Officials charged a private in the border guard for the crime, although it looked more like the work of a well-armed gang than a single soldier. Suspicion that the private had been framed was heightened when a television newscaster resigned rather than report his alleged confession.

--   On 29th May, gold miners were given a 30-35% pay increase on the first day of a strike.  Earlier in May, copper workers won a rise of 100% after striking for two days. These settlements suggest that the authorities fear another extended or bitter strike, such as that in Zhanaozen. Undue wage concessions, however, could lead to overblown demands elsewhere.

--   On 30th May, Kazakhstan's leadership lashed out at the social media for ‘spreading lies and propagating violence and evil’.

--   On 4th June, thirty-three people were convicted of inciting mass disorder in Zhanaozen last December, and thirteen were sentenced to prison. Many fewer police have been convicted of crimes related to tragic events of 16th December,  even though they were the ones doing the shooting.

'Frustrations seem to be greatest in western Kazakhstan. People there may expect a greater share of the benefits from the dynamic pace of energy development in their region.'

--  On 5th June, an activist who defended the rights of coal miners and oil workers in Zhanaozen was found dead in his apartment.

--   On 15th June, in Almaty, the authorities arrested an internationally respected theatre director on charges of ‘inciting social hatred’. The director, Bolat Atabayev, had put on a play in March that made allusions to the Zhanaozen tragedy and official repression.

What do these incidents say about Kazakhstan?

Taken together, these incidents suggest that politics and governance in Kazakhstan are fraying at the edges. The legitimacy of the current political system and leadership may be ebbing. Political life is insufficiently open and resilient to absorb conflicting pressures. There are too few checks and balances to monitor and properly restrain executive power.

Frustrations seem to be greatest in western Kazakhstan.  People there may expect a greater share of the benefits from the dynamic pace of energy development in their region. Differences between actual and expected improvements in living standards might be increasing faster there than elsewhere in Kazakhstan.

The problem in this region seems to be symptomatic of a wider challenge for Kazakhstan – an increasing gap between economic and political progress.  This gap may be fermenting popular anxieties and unrest, and eroding social strengths such as interethnic harmony. 

'Two [comparators] have made more combined political and economic progress than Kazakhstan: Slovenia and Bulgaria.  Both belong to the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Two countries have made less progress: Ukraine and Uzbekistan.'

Published rankings by independent organizations, and statistics for per capita income, make possible quantitative comparisons that shed some light on the scale of Kazakhstan's democracy gap.

On the basis of these I have made a comparison between five European and Eurasian countries formerly under communist rule -- Bulgaria, Kazakhstan, Slovenia, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. Rankings are shown for three indices of political progress and three of economic progress (see appendix below for details).

The comparators were chosen for illustrative purposes; they are not a scientific sample. Two have made more combined political and economic progress than Kazakhstan: Slovenia and Bulgaria. Both belong to the European Union and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization. Two countries have made less progress: Ukraine and Uzbekistan. 

Several conclusions may be drawn from these data.

First, two countries – Slovenia and Bulgaria -- have made the most democratic progress, and their economic progress correlates roughly with this.

Second, despite having benefitted from the popular Orange Revolution and several fair elections and peaceful transfers of power, Ukraine has made scarcely more democratic progress than Kazakhstan, mainly because of its high level of corruption.  On the economic side, Ukraine is held back by its low per capita income. As a consequence of these factors, Kazakhstan has made more overall progress than Ukraine, an aspirant to membership in the European Union.

Third, although Uzbekistan, the most populous Central Asian state, was once widely considered to be the most important player in Central Asia and a natural leader, the absence of significant political and economic reforms has left it weakened. Kazakhstan has overtaken Uzbekistan as the major power in Central Asia.  

Fourth, although Kazakhstan has made strong economic gains (it trails only Slovenia among the comparators), it has made less progress towards democracy. This imbalance may help explain why internal unease seems to be growing. The rising expectations of increasingly prosperous and educated Kazakhstanis for more participation in political life are not being met.

The lack of balance in Kazakhstan’s economic and political progress may lead to more serious tensions in the future, and a higher risk of unstable political transitions.  The issue is not whether reforms meet with Western approbation, but whether they satisfy the growing aspirations of Kazakhstanis. The problem is not that democratic reforms are too rapid, but that they are too modest.

Appendix

Comparative Political and Economic Indices for Kazakhstan

Rankings are shown by raw score, and normalized as a percentage of 100. The latter are in brackets.

1. Political Indices

1.  Transparency International, Corruption Perceptions Index 2011.  Ranks countries and territories according to their perceived levels of public sector corruption.  183 countries.  Slovenia, 35 (19); Bulgaria, 86 (47); Kazakhstan, 120 (63); Ukraine, 152 (80); Uzbekistan, 177 (94).

2.  Vision of Humanity, Global Peace Index 2012.  Ranks countries by their absence of violence, using metrics that combine both internal and external factors.  158 countries.  Slovenia, 8(5); Bulgaria, 40 (25); Ukraine, 72 (46); Kazakhstan, 106 (67); Uzbekistan, 111 (70).

3.  Foreign Policy and Fund for Peace, Failed States 2012.  Ranks countries according to indices of state failure.  177 countries. Slovenia, 16 (9); Bulgaria, 47 (27); Ukraine, 64 (36); Kazakhstan, 70 (40); Uzbekistan, 138 (78).

2. Economic Indices

World Economic Forum, Global Competitiveness Index 2011-12. Measures business operating environments and competitiveness. 142 countries.  Slovenia, 57 (40); Kazakhstan, 72 (51); Bulgaria, 74 (52); Ukraine, 82 (58); Uzbekistan, not ranked.

2. World Bank, Doing Business 2012: Doing Business in a More Transparent World.  Assesses regulations affecting domestic firms and ranks economies on business regulation, using such indices as starting a business, resolving insolvency and trading across borders.   183 countries.  Slovenia, 37 (20); Kazakhstan, 47 (26); Bulgaria, 59 (32); Ukraine, 152 (83); Uzbekistan, 166 (91).

3. World Bank, Gross National Income Per Capita 2011, Atlas Method.  215 countries. Slovenia ($23,860), 47 (22); Kazakhstan ($7,440), 90 (42); Bulgaria ($6,240),97 (45); Ukraine ($3,010), 135 (63); Uzbekistan ($1,280), 163 (76).

Averages of Indices Using Normalized Values

                     Political    Economic      Combined

                                         Average

Slovenia             11             27              19

Bulgaria             33             43              38

Kazakhstan        57             40              48

Ukraine              54             68              61

Uzbekistan         81             84              82