Recent events in Zhanaozen are forcing Kazakh authorities to rethink political, economic and social policies, Martha Brill Olcott says.
Kazakhstan's ruling Nur Otan party received 81 percent of the vote in early parliamentary elections on January 15.
Recent violence in Zhanaozen in December has forced Kazakhstan's authorities to rethink political, economic, and social policies. Only time will tell if the changes will have their desired effect, but it is the country's population that will make the ultimate judgment.
Twenty years after its independence from the Soviet Union, Kazakhstan has made a smooth transition to a middle income country and advanced a foreign policy that could make it a vital bridge between Europe and Asia.
As Kazakhstan celebrates its twentieth anniversary of independence, the country faces a number of tough geopolitical, political, economic, and social challenges.
Legacies of the Soviet era still pervade Kazakhstan, 20 years after independence, and leave most citizens unable to offer a detached judgment of what benefits Kazakhstan might have derived from seven decades of Soviet rule.
On the twentieth anniversary of the closure of Kazakhstan's nuclear site Semipalatinsk, it is important to recognize the role the former weapons testing facility plays in strengthening the verification regime of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty.
Twenty years after the disintegration of the Soviet Union, Russia’s disinterest in its former empire has been matched by the other former Soviet republics distancing themselves from the former imperial center.
The fall of the Soviet Union and end of communism in Russia caught the world by surprise twenty years ago.
Moscow needs to drop the notion of creating an exclusive power center in the post-Soviet space and reinvent itself as a global player and as part of a wider community.
The international community should focus on pressing the Kyrgyz government to respect the basic human rights of all their citizens and emphasize the importance of equality and accountability before the law.
Last June's ethnic violence in Kyrgyzstan, along with the performance of the country's new parliamentary system of government, will have wide-ranging implications for Central Asia and for regional security.
On the twentieth anniversary of the closure of Kazakhstan's nuclear site Semipalatinsk, it is important to recognize the role the former weapons testing facility plays in strengthening the verification regime of the Comprehensive Test Ban Treaty (CTBT).
Dialogue, education, and an accepted role for religion in society are critical to countering the possible threat that religious radicalization could pose to state security in Central Asia.
A bi-monthly Russian-language journal focusing on Russian and European affairs. With articles from leading policy experts from around the world, Pro et Contra is published by the Carnegie Moscow Center.
No one is fully knowledgeable about the state of the Syrian economy, how exactly it has been affected by the events taking place in the country, or how to interpret the choice economic indicators issued by Syrian officials.
The U.S. pivot to the Asia-Pacific has created both tension and opportunity in its relations with China.
The gap between the efforts to deepen integration in order to save the euro and what most people really think should happen is wider than it has ever been before.
The Russian political system is likely to undergo some changes this year, perhaps even serious ones — not because Putin wants them, but because elements of Putin's inner circle are convinced that the government must take some of the protesters' demands seriously.
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