Kyrgyz President Sadyr Japarov traveled to Kazakhstan on Tuesday for a two-day state go to, his second journey overseas as president after a late February working go to to Russia.
Japarov met with Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, signing a bevy of paperwork and issuing a joint assertion; he additionally met with First President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Prime Minister Askar Mamin, and Chair of the Mazhilis (the decrease home of parliament) Nurlan Nigmatulin.
The joint assertion conveyed a way of normalcy, with the 2 sides discussing strengthening their strategic partnership and alliance and pertaining to numerous bilateral and related multilateral efforts. “Elbasy” — Chief of the Nation, Nazarbayev — was lauded early within the assertion, highlighting his continued robust affect in Kazakhstan’s home and worldwide relations. The assertion emphasised the need of increasing enterprise and financial ties throughout a variety of sectors. The Eurasian Financial Union, which Kazakhstan holds the rotating chairmanship of, additionally made an look.
After almost 30 years of independence, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan are nonetheless aiming to “unleash the potential of cross-border cooperation.”
Along with the joint assertion, the 2 presidents oversaw the signing of at the least seven paperwork. The Kyrgyz president’s web site outlines the agreements as follows: an settlement on the supply of “gratuitous” military-technical help (presumably from Kazakhstan to Kyrgyzstan); an settlement between the 2 international locations’ tradition ministries on improvement of nationwide sports activities and folks video games; plans for cooperation between the 2 international locations’ protection ministries in 2021; a program of cooperation for the international ministries in 2021-2022; a plan for joint actions between the Kyrgyz State Inspectorate for Environmental and Technical Security and the Kazakh Ministry of Commerce and Integration; a memorandum of understanding between the Kyrgy State Service for Digital Growth and the Kazakh Ministry of Digital Growth, Innovation, and Aerospace Trade; and a protocol on the alternate of electrical energy signed between the Kyrgyz Minister of Vitality and Trade and the Kazakh Ministers of Vitality and of Ecology, Geology, and Pure Sources.
Barring the small print of the agreements, on the floor they appear to be a reasonably typical portfolio.
As Kubat Kasymbekov, a journalist with RFE/RL’s Kyrgyz Service, famous in his evaluation of the go to, regardless of being neighbors and deep historic ties Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan haven’t at all times had a super relationship.
Kazakhstan’s economic system outstrips Kyrgyzstan’s, with the previous boasting a GDP of $181.7 billion in 2019 and the latter simply $8.46 billion. The place Kazakhstan is wealthy with sources like oil and fuel, Kyrgyzstan is way much less so. Kazakhstan is Kyrgyzstan’s third largest commerce associate, after China and Russia, and the nation stands as a significant vacation spot, after Russia, of Kyrgyz labor migrants.
Kyrgyzstan’s routine political upheavals (revolutions in 2005 and 2010, then the occasions of 2020 that introduced Japarov to energy) distinction sharply with Kazakhstan’s autocratic political stability.
That actuality was highlighted by one more Kyrgyz president assembly with Nazarbayev, which Japarov did after his assembly with Tokayev. On Twitter, Kasymbekov famous that Japarov is the sixth Kyrgyz chief to satisfy with Nazarbayev within the final 30 years, attaching a picture of the Kazakh president with every of his Kyrgyz counterparts.
In some methods, the tumultuous nature of Kyrgyz politics supplies an ideal foil for the Kazakh management, who can level south and push again towards these demanding extra fast progress towards one thing nearer to real democracy. On the identical time, Kyrgyzstan appears to be on a carousel of kinds, biking by means of completely different presidents by way of numerous irregular transitions however not fairly making the progress it hopes to in democratic or improvement phrases.
Arguably the best break in relations between Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan occurred in 2017, when outgoing Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev — seldom one to reasonable his speech for the sake of diplomacy — accused Kazakhstan of meddling in Kyrgyzstan’s election. Nazarbayev had met with Omurbek Babanov, a Kyrgyz politician considered on the time as a prime challenger to Atambayev’s most popular successor (and eventual victor) Sooronbay Jeenbekov. Shortly thereafter, issues arose on the Kazakh-Kyrgyz border and features of vans bearing perishable items grew to become the victims of a diplomatic spat. Atambayev didn’t again down, calling it a blockade and delivering this prime tirade in mid-November 2017:
In spring 2014, on the whim of an identical aged dictator in one other neighboring republic, our southern areas have been lower off from pure fuel. I bear in mind how our political wirepullers, our lawmakers shouted then saying that Atambayev should go and bend to the aged dictator… Some folks appear to say that Atambayev should bend his knees in entrance of the wealthy neighbor and apologize…. It isn’t Atambayev however those that impertinently meddle in our affairs who should apologize; those that needed to place their flunky on the chair of the sovereign Kyrgyzstan’s president… Sure, their flunky will sit. Nevertheless, not on the presidential chair however in a jail cell.
The “aged dictator” referenced was Uzbekistan’s Islam Karimov and the “wealthy neighbor” Nazarbayev.
The high-level spat petered out when Jeenebkov took workplace and made a visit to Kazakhstan in December that 12 months. The border however remained an occasional ache, much more so when the coronavirus sparked lockdowns on either side of the border.
Greater than the paperwork signed, the core goal of Japarov’s go to was to make the private connections that kind the lifeblood of Central Asian interstate relations.