THREAD 1/13 Just as Russia seemed to be poised to invade Ukraine, protests broke out all over #Kazakhstan, so the Kremlin needs to divide attention between the two and manage strategic instability on two fronts.
2/13 Looks like Ukraine and NATO are no longer the only main focus of the future Russia-US talks, there is a new hot-button issue for negotiations with Biden, plus it’s harder for Putin to make a concerted effort on his key diplomatic front.
3/13 3/ If you have great power ambitions, please show what you can do on several fronts. Many others failed to that. Kazakhstan will test Russia’s actual capabilities. It will be both distracting and sobering.
4/13 4/ Watched news from Kazakhstan. So far, the country’s authorities haven’t blamed the West for the protests, as would certainly be the case in Russia or Belarus. Rather, president #Tokayev put the blame on their own government, as they might do, say, in Europe.
5/13 Kazakhstan has always tried to stay above the fray between Russia and the West. It sought to be friends with both the West and Russia (and China), as well as others – not just exploit their differences, as the Belarusian regime did.
6/13 But as soon as the dawn broke in Russia, semi-official speakers and state-run media taking their place immediately blamed the West for escalating the situation, fomenting revolution, rehashing the Belarusian scenario, attacking Russia from the other flank etc
7/13 The true official speakers – the Kremlin and the Foreign Ministry – are quiet for now. But if they echo these sentiments, Kazakhstan will have to think about how to respond to the narrative of their closest ally and the second largest neighbor.
8/13 Western politicians will also have to do some thinking. Kazakhstan is neither a Western democracy, nor the West’s closest ally. So Western media and spokespeople won’t play soft ball here and frame it as a universal narrative of popular democratic revolution against tyranny.
9/13 After the media do that, Western politicians will have to join in support for the protests, and Kazakhstan will need to respond. Therefore, the protests, which Moscow adversaries are so happy about, might in fact bring Kazakhstan closer to Moscow.
10/13 Despite some discontent among the Kazakh public and elites, Kazakhstan won’t be choosing between Moscow and democratic Europe. Kyrgyzstan’s case supports this notion – it stayed mainly true to its foreign policy despite three regime changes.
11/13 The West has another reason to be cautious on Kazakhstan. While Russia mines and exports its natural resources on its own, Kazakhstan does so as joint ventures with Western company. They mostly deal with oil, which has the cooking gas as its byproduct .
12/13 Global price increases on oil and natural gas might’ve prompted the government and its business partners to hike the prices of cooking gas, which are perhaps the cheapest in the world. And as often happens, the government overestimated people’s tolerance.
13/13 Kazakh events make Kazakhstan power transit scenario virtually impossible for Russia. Now Putin will hardly be inclined to leave his position to a successor and watch over him as a head of National Security Council or some other government body.
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