The Ukraine war appears to have strengthened Kazakhstan’s positions in the intercontinental arena. The vitality-wealthy Central Asian nation has managed to protect its “multi-vector” international coverage – balancing between Russia and the West – and now it seeks to develop closer ties with other world and regional actors.
The approaching summit of the leaders of the Business of Turkic States, that should really consider area in early November in the Kazakh funds of Astana, will be an possibility for Kazakhstan’s plan makers to boost political and economic relations not only with Turkey – an casual leader of the worldwide body of expanding world-wide visibility – but also with other Turkic international locations. Whilst closer ties with Turkey are 1 factor of Astana’s multi-vector strategy, the power-abundant Central Asian condition that has celebrated Republic Day on Oct 25 has plainly demonstrated its ambitions to turn into an critical regional gasoline hub.
Just after Russia commenced supplying all-natural gasoline to Uzbekistan (a member of the Business of Turkic States) by way of Kazakh territory in early Oct, Kazakhstan has de facto become part of a tripartite fuel union in between Moscow, Astana, and Tashkent. At the exact same time, the greatest country in Central Asia aims to raise economic cooperation with China – a big importer of Kazakh vitality. It is, thus, not astonishing that Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev participated the 3rd Belt and Street Discussion board for Worldwide Cooperation in Beijing on October seventeen-18. 1 of the goals of the summit was to mark the 10th anniversary of Belt and Street Initiative (BRI) – a enormous infrastructure development undertaking, in which Kazakhstan performs an significant part.
But other than its participation in the joint design of the Belt and Highway, Astana also eyes to get the access to the South Asian marketplaces. Kazakhstan sees Afghanistan as an significant transit state, which is why it seeks to improve its positions in “The Graveyard of Empires”. Pursuing earthquakes that strike Afghanistan in early Oct, Astana sent above 1600 tons of humanitarian assist to Afghanistan’s Herat province. Kazakhstan’s lively engagement in offering humanitarian support to the folks of Afghanistan could be interpreted as the Central Asian nation’s endeavor to develop “soft power” in the Taliban-ruled country.
In spite of the fact that the Taliban are officially viewed as in Kazakhstan a terrorist group, in 2022 the trade turnover amongst the former Soviet republic and Afghanistan reached pretty much $1 billion. Kazakh authorities reportedly seek out to increase the bilateral trade quantity to $three billion in the next yrs. The two sides just lately struck $two hundred million in new industrial specials, mainly commitments by Kazakhstan to offer Afghanistan with even more of the essential foodstuff. Presently, Kabul buys about 60 per cent of all imported flour from Kazakh producers.
But Kazakh grain organizations keep on being concentrated on other regions as very well. For instance, Kusto Agro – a company with ties to Kazakhstan which is section of the Singapore-dependent keeping enterprise Kusto Group – continues to run in Ukraine inspite of the ongoing war there. Over the previous two years, the corporation has been functioning to safeguard foodstuff protection, when in late September, it even managed to ship the 1st grain trucks with the new harvest. Meanwhile, its chairman Yerkin Tatishev, supplied power turbines to Ukraine to retain the war-torn nation’s hospitals functioning.
“The very last two decades were being of study course very challenging for everyone in Ukraine. Our priority has been to maintain men and women risk-free, but in opposition to the backdrop of the war, we have ongoing to use our progressive techniques to increase food safety and ensure the crops we sow have the most achievable yield”, mentioned Tatishev.
Agribusiness is not the only thing that connects Kazakhstan and Ukraine. Even nevertheless the Central Asian nation is Russia’s nominal ally in the Collective Protection Treaty Business (CSTO), and is also a member of the Russian-dominated Eurasian Financial Union, Astana programs to substantially maximize its financial cooperation with Ukraine. Russia, on the other hand, stays just one of Kazakhstan’s main trade companions, but that does not reduce Kazakh leaders from creating nearer economic ties with Moscow’s frenemy Turkey.
Ankara and Astana are claimed to be developing transportation ties to bypass Russia by using the Trans-Caspian intercontinental transport route, which travels through China, Kazakhstan, the Caspian Sea, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Turkey and onward to Europe. In the meantime, whole trade volume between Turkey and Kazakhstan now exceeds $5.three billion annually and Erdogan has pledged to force that to $ten billion. But that is however much less than fifty percent of the $25.5 billion in trade that Kazakhstan does with Russia. That is a person of the causes why Astana, irrespective of occasional odds with Moscow, does not system to depart the Eurasian Financial Union.
For the foreseeable foreseeable future, Kazakhstan will without doubt continue on pursuing its “multi-vector” international policy – based mostly on cooperation, balance, and pragmatism – that has renewed the country’s relations with some of the most vital geopolitical actors. However, in the lengthy-time period, Astana’s geopolitical vector will practically certainly depend on the end result of the Ukraine conflict.
[Photo by Radosław Drożdżewski, via Wikimedia Commons]
Opinions expressed in this post are those of the writer.
The writer is a Serbian freelance journalist. He writes for various publications this kind of as CGTN, Geopolitical Watch, World wide Security Overview, Global Coverage Digest and World Comment. Nikola also routinely contributes for YouTube geopolitical channel KJ Vids. He handles mostly Russia, Belarus and Ukraine.
