8. Relations with the West
Kazakhstan has leveraged its cultivation of Western institutions and governments – in particular the US – to establish a strategically valuable reputation as a reliable international partner. But it still struggles to be seen as more than a niche player.
For many years, under the leadership of President Nursultan Nazarbayev, Kazakhstan zealously aspired to a greater international role and increased recognition. Whenever an opportunity arose to shine on the world stage, Kazakhstani officials seized it with enthusiasm. Aiming to boost the country’s regional and international standing is a part of Kazakhstan’s foreign policy ‘concept’ for 2014–20, which lists the achievement of a ‘sustainable international position and positive global image of Kazakhstan’ as one of the country’s main goals.404
One way Kazakhstan has sought to accomplish this has been to volunteer as a multi-purpose host for high-level events, which has proved quite effective. The country has been the venue for Syrian peace talks, the EXPO-2017 and the Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions, to name just a few. It was also a finalist among the contenders to host the 2022 Winter Olympics, but narrowly lost out to Beijing.
While these events were aimed at a global audience, acceptance and validation from the West are what Kazakhstan has primarily sought – and still seeks. This may be a consequence of Moscow’s latent, long-standing low regard for Kazakhstan and its people (mostly due to Russian memory of the Kazakhs’ generally low level of literacy when Kazakhstan became part of the Soviet Union). But the West has not reciprocated Kazakhstan’s overtures to the extent desired by the country’s leadership.
As with other former Soviet republics, the West welcomed Kazakhstan’s emergence as a newly independent state in 1991. The country also initially attracted special attention because of the inherited cache of Soviet nuclear weapons on its territory and its significant, but mostly untapped, oil reserves. However, the nuclear weapons were quickly disposed of, while the geopolitics of oil had largely played out by the end of the 2000s, leaving Kazakhstan with reduced leverage with which to boost its international standing. Notwithstanding the country’s continuing role as a transit route for goods shipped to Afghanistan by the US and its allies, Western interest in Kazakhstan since the 1990s has ebbed and flowed.
Over the same period, Kazakhstan’s own interest in the West has also evolved. There was a period during the early post-independence years when it aspired to Western values, or at least did not object much to being nudged in that direction by the countless Western democracy advisers who had descended on Kazakhstan.
The geopolitical developments following the attacks of 9/11 changed the dynamics. Kazakhstan’s active support for the US-led campaign in Afghanistan prompted Western governments and policymakers to de-emphasize criticisms of Kazakhstan’s democratic shortcomings. Today, Kazakhstan largely pays lip service to democratic values when it makes pronouncements on political governance, instead focusing on using its partnerships with Western countries as a counterweight to Russia.
The early days and the American embrace
Kazakhstan declared independence on 16 December 1991. The following day, US Secretary of State James Baker was in Almaty, then Kazakhstan’s capital and still called Alma-Ata, to meet with President Nazarbayev. The US wanted to avoid the creation of any new nuclear-armed states in the region. Baker sought assurances that Kazakhstan’s nuclear weapons would remain under a single authority, namely Russia’s, and that measures would be taken to prevent their proliferation.405
Baker later recounted in great detail this trip, and his discussions with Nazarbayev on this and other occasions, in his memoir The Politics of Diplomacy. It was a time of uncertainty, and the stakes for the US were high. But what stands out is his vivid description of how the two men built their relationship when they first met in Kazakhstan a few months earlier. After the formal part of their meeting, Nazarbayev invited Baker to an ‘eastern-style’ sauna in the presidential banya (bath house), where they drank vodka and relaxed.406 These official and unofficial encounters helped cement the ties between the US and Kazakhstan in the early days. They were also a first indicator of how Kazakhstan likes to develop and maintain relations with other states – i.e. on a bilateral basis combined with hospitality and a personal touch. On 25 December 1991, the US became the first nation to recognize Kazakhstan’s independence.
With independence, Kazakhstan became the world’s fourth-largest nuclear power, with 1,410 (former Soviet) strategic nuclear warheads, an undisclosed number of tactical nuclear weapons and secret production facilities. It had one of the world’s largest nuclear weapons testing sites in Semipalatinsk in the northeast, also known as the Polygon, where at least 456 nuclear tests, both above and below ground, had taken place over a 40-year period. Near Semipalatinsk (now called Semey), in the city of Ust-Kamenogorsk (now Oskemen), a metallurgical plant held sufficient quantities of highly enriched uranium to fabricate about two dozen nuclear weapons. In the town of Stepnogorsk, also in the north, there was a biological weapons construction facility.
Nazarbayev shut down the Semipalatinsk test site in August 1991, as the Soviet Union began to disintegrate. Shortly after independence, Kazakhstan voluntarily renounced its nuclear arsenal.
In his authorized biography on Nazarbayev, Jonathan Aitken describes the Kazakh president as wanting the following:
… international recognition, respectability, investment and security. These objectives were incompatible with keeping the nuclear arsenal in place, a move which would have swiftly resulted in Kazakhstan’s isolation as a pariah state. So, for reasons of political realism as well as moral idealism, Nazarbayev was determined to lead his country to nuclear disarmament.407
In return, the US announced in 1994 that it would substantially increase its aid to Kazakhstan.
In the US fiscal years 1992 to 2010, $2.05 billion in US aid was budgeted for Kazakhstan, putting it in fifth position for aid among 12 Soviet successor states.408 A large part of this assistance was used for the Nunn–Lugar Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) programme, through which the US helped Kazakhstan to dismantle its weapons of mass destruction and associated infrastructure. For example, the US helped Kazakhstan seal 13 boreholes and 181 tunnels at the nuclear test site between 1995 and 2001.409 The last of the nuclear warheads left Kazakhstani territory for Russia in 1995.
In 2014, Kazakhstan was again widely praised by US politicians and experts for its courage in trusting its new relationship with the US to help prevent the proliferation of dangerous material in countries seeking to build nuclear weapons
One of the success stories of the programme was Project Sapphire, a covert operation in November 1994 between the US and Kazakhstan to transport 600 kg of highly enriched uranium from the plant in Ust-Kamenogorsk to the Oak Ridge National Laboratory in Tennessee for safekeeping. This was also one of the first occasions on which Kazakhstan received broad news coverage in the US media.
On the 20th anniversary of the project in 2014, Kazakhstan was again widely praised by US politicians and experts for its courage in trusting its new relationship with the US to help prevent the proliferation of dangerous material in countries seeking to build nuclear weapons. Former secretary of state Baker was also credited for having engaged Nazarbayev early on over denuclearization and energy cooperation.410 Nazarbayev then used Kazakhstan’s newly gained reputation for having acted safely and responsibly to its advantage, turning his country into a vocal advocate of global nuclear non-proliferation and disarmament. He said that Kazakhstan had a moral right to do so.411 The country’s initiatives in this sphere included, for example, the establishment of a nuclear-weapons-free zone in Central Asia in 2006. It also led to the 2012 launch by Kazakhstan of the ATOM (Abolish Testing. Our Mission) Project, an initiative to mobilize global public opinion in support of a permanent end to nuclear weapons testing and the total abolition of nuclear weapons.
In 2017, Nazarbayev and Karipbek Kuyukov, the honorary ambassador to the ATOM Project and a victim of nuclear radiation, were nominated for the Nobel Peace Prize for their efforts for nuclear abolition.
The reticent European partner
Several European states were also quick to recognize Kazakhstan’s independence and establish diplomatic relations. Germany was the first in Europe to recognize the country’s independence, on 31 December 1991; this would later pay diplomatic dividends, since Kazakhstani officials kept a close eye on which countries were eager to support Kazakhstan’s sovereignty and which were sluggish in doing so. The UK, for example, established diplomatic relations on 19 January 1992, France on 25 January 1992, and Spain on 11 February 1992. For years, the Central State Museum in Almaty has proudly displayed a long list of countries with the dates on which they recognized Kazakhstan.412
Unlike the US, the European states and the EU had more modest agendas and largely continued to view Kazakhstan as a remote actor best handled via embassies in Moscow and Ankara. The UK and France were exceptions, as they had a growing interest in Kazakhstan’s oil and gas reserves. Germany was also committed to Kazakhstan and the region. It was the only European country to have an embassy in all five Central Asian republics in the 1990s, its special ties to Kazakhstan reflecting the fact that nearly 1 million ethnic Germans were living in the country. In the years that followed, the great majority of these people would leave Kazakhstan to return to their historic homeland, with financial and logistical support from the German state.
All the while, Kazakhstan’s leadership felt culturally and geographically drawn to Europe in a way it was not to the US. Perhaps in part because Kazakhstan had been so thoroughly Russified under Soviet rule, to the detriment of its own culture and traditions, many Kazakhstanis viewed European culture as the gold standard to be emulated – at least during the first post-Soviet decade. Moreover, a small part of Kazakhstan’s vast territory in the far western corner is considered to be a part of Europe, a fact often pointed out by officials.413 Being a transcontinental country has allowed Kazakhstan to position itself as a bridge between East and West, and has been used as a selling point for various international initiatives and events.
Kazakhstan’s relations with the EU were defined by the Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (PCA), signed on 23 January 1995, which entered into force on 1 July 1999. This agreement provided a framework for relations based on supporting Kazakhstan’s efforts to consolidate its democracy through political dialogue, and on assisting the country in developing its economy and moving towards a market economy. Several other joint agreements followed.
The EU was one of the largest single donors to Central Asia at the time. Between 1991 and 2003, it provided more than €1 billion to the region, of which €465 million was disbursed through the TACIS (Technical Assistance to the Commonwealth of Independent States) programme.
Yet people in Kazakhstan had limited awareness of the EU in the early 1990s. The EU was hardly noticed in the public discourse. Local newspapers focused on bilateral relations with individual European countries, and neglected cooperation with the EU.414 Initially, the media mainly covered domestic politics, and publications on Kazakhstan’s foreign policy were scarce. Those publications that did write about foreign affairs concentrated on the country’s bilateral relations with foreign partners, its interaction within the framework of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), or the experiences and challenges of ethnic Kazakhs living abroad. Pro-government newspapers were the main source of information about the EU in Kazakhstan. The opposition media generally concentrated on domestic politics.415
Over time, a split emerged in terms of how the local media wrote about the EU. Official newspapers looked at the EU’s cooperation with Kazakhstan or Central Asia overall. For example, they reported on the regular bilateral EU–Kazakhstan meetings and talks between the EU institutions and delegations of Central Asian republics. Opposition newspapers, on the other hand, published news reports on EU politics and economics, including domestic EU issues such as the eurozone crisis and elections in certain member states.416
The EU, in turn, only started to pay closer attention to Central Asia after the 9/11 terrorist attacks against the US. This later culminated in the adoption of the EU Strategy for a New Partnership with Central Asia (commonly referred to as the ‘Central Asia Strategy’) in June 2007, when Germany held the rotating presidency of the EU.
The focus of Western oil and security interests
Kazakhstan has the world’s 12th-largest oil reserves, which have attracted international oil companies, particularly US and British ones. US oil major Chevron took the lead when it signed an agreement with Kazakhstan to develop the giant Tengiz oil field in April 1993. This was often referred to as the ‘deal of the century’, and was considered a bellwether for foreign investments in Kazakhstan and throughout the former Soviet Union.
Other contracts with Western oil companies followed. Their technology, expertise and financial means were superior to Russia’s. Kazakhstan needed these companies to rebuild and grow its economy after the collapse of the Soviet Union. In turn, the Western oil companies were hopeful of an exploration bonanza: they needed Kazakhstan to meet their constant demand for new acreage to replenish their oil reserves.
Oil production in Kazakhstan has more than quadrupled since the mid-1990s: the country is currently the 13th-largest producer in the world, with output at 1.9 million barrels a day (91.2 million tonnes) in 2018.417 But once contracts for the largest oil prospects – i.e. Tengiz, Karachaganak and Kashagan – had been signed and the decade-long US–Russian rivalry over building new pipelines from Kazakhstan and Azerbaijan resolved,418 the attention of the Western oil companies shifted elsewhere. So did the focus of the US government. For example, the position of a US special envoy for Eurasian energy security, especially created to bolster Washington’s Caspian Sea pipeline diplomacy, was no longer needed. The opening of the Baku–Tbilisi–Ceyhan pipeline in 2006, the Western pipeline route for which the US had fought so hard, effectively ended the years of hype over Caspian Sea hydrocarbon exploration that had started in the mid- to late 1990s. Since then, China has made significant inroads in Kazakhstan’s oil industry.
The US-led war in Afghanistan following 9/11 drew worldwide attention to Central Asia. Kazakhstan, being the furthest from the war zone and, unlike Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, not chosen as a site for a Western military base, initially appeared to be on the margin of the US-led coalition’s response. But years after the closure of these bases, Kazakhstan continues to make a substantial contribution by allowing the coalition to ship cargo across its territory to Uzbekistan and from there into Afghanistan. For this role Kazakhstan has been praised by US President Donald Trump.
So far relations have been comparatively smooth with Trump, who – unlike other US presidents – is not known to have made any demands on Kazakhstan over its democratic failings and human rights abuses
In January 2018, Nazarbayev flew to Washington for his first meeting with Trump. Nazarbayev has met every US president since George H. W. Bush. The two men discussed an ‘enhanced strategic partnership’ between the US and Kazakhstan for the 21st century, and were complimentary about each other. So far relations have been comparatively smooth with Trump, who – unlike other US presidents – is not known to have made any demands on Kazakhstan over its democratic failings and human rights abuses. At the time of their encounter, Kazakhstan held a rotating seat at the UN Security Council, an achievement hailed as a foreign policy success in Kazakhstan.
Two months after the presidents’ encounter, Kazakhstan’s lawmakers allowed the US to use two of its Caspian Sea ports, Aktau and Kuryk, as transit points for shipping non-military materiel to Afghanistan. This gave the US additional options in steering clear of Russia, which previously offered transit routes for supplies to Afghanistan. Peace has not yet returned to Afghanistan, but the international spotlight on it has greatly diminished. Attention has shifted to other locations such as Iran, North Korea and Syria. In recent times Kazakhstan has drawn global coverage only for rocket and satellite launches at the Baikonur cosmodrome; for cases of corruption; for events such as its presidential election in 2019; and occasionally for reports on the Syria talks in Astana (recently renamed Nur-Sultan), which have been ongoing for more than two years.
The European upgrade of relations to Kazakhstan
Following 9/11, the EU passed a new strategy for TACIS assistance to the region and doubled its assistance budget. Its three objectives were to promote security and conflict prevention, to eliminate sources of political and social tension, and to improve the climate for trade and investment.419 However, the announcement of the funding increase was misleading in terms of the EU’s absolute commitment, as the doubled amount still came to just €50 million.
A few years later, on 22 June 2007, the EU Strategy for a New Partnership with Central Asia was adopted. For the first time, this gave the EU a comprehensive framework for its policy on Central Asia. It marked an ‘upgrade in relations’, according to the EU,420 and defined the priorities for EU development aid and diplomatic activity in the region. These priorities included responding to security threats, protecting human rights, promoting economic development, developing transport and energy links, and ensuring environmental protection. The new strategy also provided for an increase in aid to Central Asia to €750 million for the period 2007–13.
The strategy’s success has been debatable. In January 2019, almost a dozen years later, the European Parliamentary Research Service (EPRS) said that ‘progress in these (priority) areas has been uneven’, but that the issues identified back then are still highly relevant today. It cites as success the intensification of diplomatic contacts with the region.421 That said, among the many criticisms of the strategy has been the EU’s failure to provide an action plan or to set benchmarks,422 as well as the fact that the strategy has sought to cover far too much ground.
The EPRS also noted that, in areas such as human rights, anti-corruption efforts and economic diversification, there had been little change for the better over the years. But these aspects for the most part are outside the EU’s control, and the lack of results should not be blamed on the strategy. Modest improvements, such as Kazakhstan’s judicial reforms and renewable energy programme, were hailed as indicators that EU engagement is gradually bringing about a change of mindset on some questions.423 This latter assessment is probably more wishful thinking than based in reality, however. For example, while EU-backed reforms have sought to improve Kazakhstan’s criminal justice system, the rule of law remains weak.
The EU’s Central Asia Strategy certainly deepened and strengthened relations with Kazakhstan in some respects. But in spite of the positive rhetoric, it also showed that the EU has continued to see the region – or, rather, the countries east of the Caspian Sea – as a backwater. The funding and attention dedicated to the strategy were far less than for the EU’s Eastern Partnership states: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine.
For 2014–20, the EU has allocated €1.1 billion to development cooperation with Central Asia, including more than €454 million for regional programmes.424 In December 2015, Astana and Brussels signed an Enhanced Partnership and Cooperation Agreement (EPCA) to further strengthen ties, but at the time of writing the European Council had yet to confirm completion of the EPCA’s ratification by all EU member states.
It should also be noted that Kazakhstan under Nazarbayev was inclined to give preference to bilateral and personal relations over multilateral relations. A typical example was the creation in 2012 of the Berlin Eurasian Club, which has so far held 27 meetings, instead of a club that would include all the EU countries. This tendency may continue under the new president, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev. In his memoirs about his time as foreign minister, Tokayev delights in telling how Nazarbayev offered a hunter’s set as a gift to George H. W. Bush, who by then was out of office.425 After all, cultivating personal ties matters more in Central Asian society than developing and maintaining institutionalized contacts.
On 15 May 2019, the European Commission and the EU’s High Representative for Foreign Affairs and Security Policy adopted a revised and updated strategy called ‘The EU and Central Asia: New Opportunities for a Stronger Partnership’. The process of developing a new strategy was launched in 2017. There was a realization that Central Asia had become more important for the EU, that the dynamics in the region had changed, and that Central Asia could help to stabilize Afghanistan. Uzbekistan had begun to open up under a new president, and China’s Belt and Road Initiative was reviving traditional Silk Road trade routes connecting the Far East with Europe. Moreover, Russia does not seem to resent European influence in Central Asia as much as in Eastern Europe. The region has therefore not become subject to geopolitical confrontation.426 Kazakhstan has welcomed the EU’s new Central Asia strategy, describing it as ‘visionary’. The authorities are clearly happy that Kazakhstan was consulted and could make contributions to the proposed document.427
According to the EPRS, the EU has become the main economic player in the region, ahead of Russia and China. EU trade with and investment in Central Asia are overwhelmingly concentrated on Kazakhstan, notably the country’s oil sector. The sector accounted for 85 per cent of Kazakhstan’s exports to the EU and the bulk of EU direct investment in Kazakhstan in 2017. The importance of the economic relationship to Kazakhstan is evident in the fact that almost 40 per cent of the country’s external trade is now with the EU,428 and almost 60 per cent of foreign direct investment comes from the bloc.429 In contrast, Central Asia as a whole accounts for only a minute share – less than 1 per cent – of the EU’s total foreign trade and investment.430
Compared to the other four Central Asian states, Kazakhstan is in by far better economic shape. It is better integrated with the global economy and its regional neighbours. Kazakhstan became a member of the World Trade Organization in 2015, its accession bid aided – according to the EPRS – by EU expertise.
Compared to the other four Central Asian states, Kazakhstan is in by far better economic shape
Much could be said about the strengths and weaknesses of the EU’s old and the new Central Asia strategies. On balance, a useful side-effect of EU policy and engagement for Kazakhstan’s leadership has been the added opportunity to network with European leaders and to maintain links with them once they have left office. International events in Kazakhstan, such as the annual Astana Economic Forum, are known for hosting former presidents and prime ministers from Europe, some of whom also act as advisers to the Kazakhstani government. Among them have been, for example, Italy’s former prime minister, Romano Prodi, Poland’s former president, Aleksander Kwasniewski, and Germany’s former chancellor, Gerhard Schroeder. All of these figures are presumably still well connected and carry some political weight in their home countries, which could be to Kazakhstan’s advantage.
Best known has been former UK prime minister Tony Blair’s association with Kazakhstan. Blair was named an adviser to Astana in 2011. In the course of his five-year tenure in the role, Kazakhstan became even more authoritarian, which suggests that, whatever advice Blair gave, he had no impact on the regime’s anti-democratic leanings. Blair also reportedly received millions of dollars annually for providing public relations guidance, and became one of Kazakhstan’s most outspoken defenders in the West.431
In addition, a number of European public relations firms have been hired by Kazakhstan to help polish the country’s image and raise its visibility. Among them have been Bell Pottinger in London, BGR Gabara in Brussels and Consultum Communications in Berlin.432 More public relations companies were hired in the US.
These firms, as well as the former European heads of government, were all clearly drawn to Kazakhstan because of the money that could be made there. Thanks to its oil, Kazakhstan has had the funds to pay for this.
Conclusion
Kazakhstan has been the main local partner for the EU, and a key partner for the US, in Central Asia for many years. Yet beyond issues narrowly affecting the region, Kazakhstan is not especially important to either the EU or the US. This is unlikely to change given the political, economic and geographic realities.
The country has acquired a reputation for being a reliable international player – based, for example, on its performance as chair of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE) in 2010 and when holding a rotating seat at the UN Security Council in 2017 and 2018. Yet it is still a long way from being treated on an equal footing by Western countries. One of the reasons for this is its reputation for being undemocratic and corrupt, and for violating human rights. As a result, Kazakhstan usually ranks in the lower third of most indexes for assessing the state of a country.433
Of particular note has been a series of information leaks over the past few years, such as those published in the Panama Papers showing the extent of corruption among Kazakhstan’s elite. Government officials and their families, including Nazarbayev’s family members, were shown to be users of offshore havens, where they have registered – among other things – luxury real estate, a yacht, other possessions and interests in offshore companies. It seems that Kazakhstan’s officials have attentively studied everything the West has had to offer, but have not come to the conclusions favoured by Western politicians. Instead of adopting and adhering to democratic standards and observing the rule of law, their choice has been to utilize shady Western financial services instead.
Western engagement has not equalled democratization in Kazakhstan, contrary to post-independence hopes, in particular on the part of the US. This has not prevented the US and Europe from maintaining good relations, largely based on oil and energy trade, with Kazakhstan. But the relationships could have long been enhanced – not only in name, but in reality – were it not for Kazakhstan’s lack of progress in human rights and the rule of law.
This offers Tokayev an opportunity to further relations with the West. Although he remains beholden to ex-president Nazarbayev, who stepped down in March and then made sure to restrict his successor’s powers a few months later, Tokayev can try to make his mark if he so chooses. He is a seasoned diplomat, speaks several languages and knows the world. A few small or token improvements would be a start. Better treatment of dissenters and activists, for example, or the swift punishment of corrupt officials who try to conceal illicit wealth in offshore accounts could earn him respect both at home and abroad. It would indeed change how the country is perceived, especially in the West, and would bring Kazakhstan closer to where the country’s leadership would like it to be.
404 Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan (2014), ‘Foreign Policy Concept for 2014–2020 Republic of Kazakhstan’, http://mfa.gov.kz/en/content-view/kontseptsiya-vneshnoj-politiki-rk-na-2014-2020-gg (accessed 4 Nov. 2019).
405 Devroy, A. (1991), ‘Kazakhstan Keeping Nuclear Arms, Republic’s President Tells Baker’, Washington Post, 18 December 1991, https://nsarchive2.gwu.edu/NunnLugar/2015/03.%201991-12-18%20Washington%20Post%20Article%20by%20David%20Hoffman,%20Kazakhstan%20Keeping%20Nuclear%20Arms,%20Republic’s%20President%20Tells%20Baker.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
406 Present at this gathering was Bob Strauss, the US’s last ambassador to the Soviet Union and its first ambassador to the Russian Federation. When Nazarbayev took a bundle of eucalyptus branches and proceeded, as is customary, to beat Baker’s back and legs with it, Strauss said he had had enough and left. Outside, he told the security detail jokingly: ‘Get me the President of the United States on the phone. His Secretary of State is buck naked, and he’s being beaten by the President of Kazakhstan.’ Baker, J. A. (1995), The Politics of Diplomacy, New York: Putnam Adult, pp. 538–39.
407 Aitken, J. (2009), Nazarbayev and the Making of Kazakhstan, London/New York: Continuum, pp. 140–41.
408 Nichol, J. (2013), Kazakhstan: Recent Developments and U.S. Interests, Washington, DC: Congressional Research Service, 22 July 2013, p. 23, https://fas.org/sgp/crs/row/97-1058.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
409 Nuclear Threat Initiative (2019), ‘Nuclear Disarmament Kazakhstan’, 2 January 2019, https://www.nti.org/analysis/articles/kazakhstan-nuclear-disarmament/ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
410 Courtney, W., Koch, S. and Starr, J. (2014), ‘Celebrating the Success of Project Sapphire’, The National Interest, 21 November 2014, https://nationalinterest.org/feature/celebrating-the-success-project-sapphire-11709 (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
411 Pillalamarri, A. (2016), ‘Does Kazakhstan Get Nuclear Proliferation?’, The Diplomat, 2 April 2016, https://thediplomat.com/2016/04/does-kazakhstan-get-nuclear-nonproliferation/ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
412 Qazaqstan Tarihy (2014), ‘Recognition of Kazakhstan’s Independence by International Community’, 15 December 2014, https://e-history.kz/en/publications/view/879 (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
413 This was one of the main arguments used by Kazakhstan to support its application for membership of the Union of European Football Associations (UEFA), which was granted in 2002. After independence, Kazakhstan initially joined the Asian Football Confederation (AFC) together with the other four Central Asian states.
414 Ospanova, B., Sadri, H. A. and Yelmurzayeva, R. (2017), ‘Assessing EU perception in Kazakhstan’s mass media’, Journal of Eurasian Studies, 8(1): p. 75, doi: 10.1016/j.euras.2016.08.002 (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
415 Ibid.
416 Ibid., p. 76.
417 BP (2019), BP Statistical Review of World Energy, 68th edition, London: BP, pp. 16–17, https://www.bp.com/content/dam/bp/business-sites/en/global/corporate/pdfs/energy-economics/statistical-review/bp-stats-review-2019-full-report.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
418 When Kazakhstan became independent, it had no oil export pipelines, except for a low-capacity pipeline to Samara in Russia. Being a landlocked country, this was a problem. As oil production grew, new ways to get crude oil to the market had to be found, leading foreign oil companies and governments to vigorously compete for a slice of Kazakhstan’s energy pie. A breakthrough for Kazakhstan was the opening of the pipeline of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium (CPC) in 2001. This pipeline runs from Atyrau in the west of the country to Novorossiisk on the Russian Black Sea. Intent on breaking Russia’s monopoly, Europe and particularly the US went to great lengths to lobby for the construction of another pipeline that would run west towards Europe instead of north through Russian territory. The CPC pipeline exports nearly 60 per cent of Kazakhstan’s annual oil production. Reuters (2019), ‘CPC pipeline exports 61.1 mln T of oil in 2018, sees 11 pct rise in 2019’, 10 January 2019, https://ru.reuters.com/article/companyNews/idUKL8N1ZA2EZ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
419 European Commission (2003), ‘Commission approves EUR 50 million package to support Central Asian countries in regional co-operation and transition to a market economy’, Brussels: European Commission Press Release Database, 5 September 2003, http://europa.eu/rapid/press-release_IP-03-1209_en.htm (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
420 European External Action Service (2009), The EU and Central Asia: The New Partnership in Action, Brussels: EEAS, p. 7, https://eeas.europa.eu/sites/eeas/files/the_european_union_and_central_asia_the_new_partnership_in_action.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
421 Russell, M. (2019), The EU’s new Central Asia strategy, Brussels: European Parliamentary Research Service, p. 1, http://www.europarl.europa.eu/RegData/etudes/BRIE/2019/633162/EPRS_BRI(2019)633162_EN.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
422 Boonstra, J. (2018), ‘Towards a new EU Strategy for Central Asia’, EUCAM Watch, Issue 18, p. 2, https://eucentralasia.eu/2018/02/towards-a-new-eu-strategy-for-central-asia/ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
423 Russell (2019), The EU’s new Central Asia strategy, p. 10.
424 European External Action Service (2019), ‘EU Builds A Strong and Modern Partnership with Central Asia’, Brussels: EEAS, https://eeas.europa.eu/sites/eeas/files/factsheet_centralasia_2019.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
425 Apparently, Bush was stunned when Nazarbayev threw a bearskin on the floor and said that the bear had been killed in eastern Kazakhstan. Bush responded by saying he really wanted to go there to hunt. Tokayev, K. (2004), Meeting the Challenge. Memoirs by Kazakhstan’s Foreign Minister, New York: Global Scholarly Publications, p. 213.
426 Russell (2019), The EU’s new Central Asia strategy, pp. 1–2.
427 Gotev, G. (2019), ‘Kazakhstan calls EU’s new Central Asia strategy “visionary”’, Euractiv, 29 May 2019, https://www.euractiv.com/
section/central-asia/interview/kazakhstan-calls-eus-new-central-asia-strategy-visionary/ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
428 Kazakhstan’s merchandise exports to the EU amounted to €20.8 billion in 2018, while imports from the EU totalled €5.8 billion. European Commission (2019), ‘Countries and regions: Kazakhstan’, https://ec.europa.eu/trade/policy/countries-and-regions/countries/kazakhstan/ (accessed 8 Nov. 2019).
429 Jeune, P. (2019), ‘Business environment in #Kazakhstan continues to attract EU investment’, Eureporter, 28 February 2019, https://www.eureporter.co/economy/2019/02/28/business-environment-in-kazakhstan-continues-to-attract-eu-investment/ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
430 Russell (2019), The EU’s new Central Asia strategy, p. 3.
431 Michel, C. (2016), ‘Good Riddance? Tony Blair Parts Ways with Kazakhstan’, The Diplomat, 7 October 2016, https://thediplomat.com/2016/10/good-riddance-tony-blair-parts-ways-with-kazakstan/ (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
432 Corporate Europe Observatory (2015), Spin Doctors to the Autocrats: How European PR Firms Whitewash Repressive Regimes, Brussels: Corporate Europe Observatory, pp. 39–42, https://corporateeurope.org/sites/default/files/20150120_spindoctors_mr.pdf (accessed 27 Aug. 2019).
433 Not counting the indexes for economic performance and healthcare. On democracy, see, for example, The Economist Intelligence Unit (2019), Democracy Index 2018: Me too?.