Kazakhstan’s president said in a televised speech Friday that he ordered security forces to “shoot to kill without warning” in an attempt to forcibly suppress an unexpected uprising, adding that those who failed to surrender “need to be destroyed.”
Why it matters: “Dozens” of protesters have been killed and around 4,000 arrested, according to the government. At least 18 security forces have also been killed. A phone and internet blackout has made it virtually impossible to track events nationally, but the order will likely result in more deaths.
Driving the news: Russian paratroopers arrived in Kazakhstan on Thursday as part of a regional peacekeeping mission requested by Tokayev.
The protests began over the weekend in western Kazakhstan after the government lifted a cap on fuel prices. They swiftly spread to Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city, and around the country.
The big picture: Kazakhstan is effectively a one-party state that has been dominated since independence from the Soviet Union by Nursultan Nazarbayev and his family and close associates.
On Wednesday, Tokayev removed Nazarbayev from the Security Council, possibly to appease the protesters chanting “old man, go away.”
Details: Stanislav Zas, secretary-general of the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), said Thursday that the mission would include an initial 2,500 soldiers from Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Russia and Tajikistan and could last “several days to several weeks.”
China, for which neighboring Kazakhstan is an important source of oil and key transport corridor for the Belt and Road Initiative, has been relatively quiet, though state media has noted Tokayev’s claim that the protesters had foreign backing.
Source: www.axious.com
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