-16 c 1 (91) kazakhstan supports, participates president … · 2020-03-24 · 0° / -16°c...

0° / -16°C No 1 (91) www.astanatimes.comWednesday, January 13, 2016

US$ 1 = 365.07 KZT 1 Euro = 394.17 KZT 1 Rouble = 4.79 KZT

InSIdEnaTIonnazarbayev approves ethics Code for Civil servants a2Healthcare Budgeting in Kazakhstan seeks Ways to Improve a2

Economy&BUSInESSKazakhstan Continues to Increase Gold reserves a4Container Trains Begin Operation along Lianyungang-duisburg route a5

EdIToRIaLSeaeu Poised for More Work in 2016 as Kazakhstan assumes Chairmanship a6Iran nuclear deal, Kazakhstan’s role Were Bright Spots in Difficult Year a6

oPInIonSnaZarBayev: Plan of the nation – the Path to the Kazakhstan dream a7CaMerOn: shakespeare Lives a6

naTIon&caPITaLKazakh art studio releases Comics about Zombie apocalypse B1astana energy Companies reduce Polluting emissions B8

Kazakhstan Supports, Participates in Implementing Iran nuclear deal

By malika orazgaliyeva

asTana – President nursultan nazarbayev said dec. 30 that Ka-zakhstan welcomes progress in im-plementing the agreement between the international community and Iran, called the Joint Comprehensive Plan of action (JCPOa) on Iran’s nuclear programme, and the oppor-tunity to participate in the process.

In a detailed statement released by the akorda presidential resi-dence on the same day, nazarbayev said Kazakhstan’s participation in implementing JCPOa, which was approved in July 2015, comes at the request of european union High representative for Foreign affairs and security Policy Fed-erica Mogherini, who serves as co-

ordinator of the Joint Commission of the P5+1 and Iran. The P5+1 consists of international mediators representing China, France, Ger-many, russia, the united Kingdom and the united states.

“Taking into account that politi-cal and diplomatic solution is the only right way to resolve the situ-ation around Iran’s nuclear pro-gramme and considering historical significance of the adoption of the JCPOA, which will significantly strengthen regional and interna-tional security, as well as con-tribute to normalisation of Iran’s relations with the international community, positively impact the economic and social development of all countries in the region and improve Kazakh-Iranian relations, Kazakhstan decided to satisfy the

request of Joint Commission of “P5+1” and Iran,” nazarbayev said in the statement as he ex-plained the reasons for his coun-try’s support of the deal.

Thus, on dec. 27, in coordina-tion with the P5+1, Iran, the In-ternational atomic energy agency (Iaea) and relevant structures of the un security Council, Kazakh-stan’s national atomic Company Kazatomprom supplied Iran with 60 metric tons of natural uranium on commercial terms as compen-sation for the removal of low-en-riched uranium (Leu) from that country specified in the JCPOA.norway was reportedly responsi-ble for paying for the shipment of uranium from Kazakhstan to Iran.

as reported earlier, a ship de-parted Iran for russia earlier in

december carrying over 25,000 pounds (11,340 kgs) of low-en-riched uranium. The shipment in-cluded the removal of all of Iran’s nuclear material enriched to 20 percent. according to the dec. 28 statement from u.s. secretary of state, “this was a great step for Iran in order to meet its commit-ment to have no more than 300 kg of low-enriched uranium by Im-plementation day,” a day when the Iaea will need to verify that Iran completed all his nuclear commit-ments.

“Kazakhstan has always sup-ported the process of international consultations on the Iranian nucle-ar programme and made a practi-cal contribution to it,” the Kazakh presidential statement said.

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President Details Reforms, ‘Path to the Kazakhstan Dream’


asTana – Kazakhstan’s Plan of the nation to create the pillars of a developed democratic and eco-nomically strong state came into effect Jan. 1. On Jan. 6, the akorda presidential residence website pub-lished an article by President nur-sultan nazarbayev titled, “Plan of the nation – The Path to the Ka-zakhstan dream,” which provided details on the efforts to implement the Plan of nation.

The Plan of the nation, called “100 Concrete steps on realisa-tion of five institutional reforms,” basically came into full being on Jan. 1. That means that on Jan. 1, 2016 the majority of 59 laws adopted by, Parliament last year as part of the reform agenda will enter into force and create a new legal environment for the devel-opment of the state, economy and society. They are meant to lead the nation to becoming one of the top 30 most developed countries

in the world, the President said in his opinion.

according to nazarbayev’s article, the Plan of the nation includes five institutional re-forms that are anti-crisis meas-ures in response to the global economic crisis. The five re-forms include the formation of a professional state apparatus; the rule of law; industrialisation and economic growth; identity and unity, and the formation of accountable government. The 100 Concrete steps are more detailed measures to implement those five reforms.

The first reform is the creation of a modern and professional civil ser-vice. The new law on civil service was adopted in conjunction with new anti-corruption legislation and establishes the basic framework of the new model of civil service. The new model is meant to improve the effectiveness of the entire public administration.


Issekeshev Appointed Investment Ombudsman,

One Stop Shop for Investors Expands


asTana – In connection with Kazakhstan’s aim to become one of the top 30 most developed coun-tries in the world, the government is striving to ensure effective ef-forts to attract foreign investment flow into the country. These efforts recently included two important developments, the naming of an investment ombudsman and the es-tablishment of a one-stop shop for investors where they can get their issues addressed.

Prime Minister Karim Massi-mov signed a government resolu-tion appointing current Minister of Investment and development as-set Issekeshev to the post effective Jan. 1. The new document, inked Oct. 30, 2014, is in accordance with the law on investments dated Jan. 8, 2003.

as investment ombudsman, Is-sekeshev will manage a work-ing group composed of heads and deputy heads of the General Pros-ecutor’s Office and all government ministries to address investment-related issues and propose legisla-tion. Issekeshev will be guided in his activities by the Constitution, the country’s laws, as well as acts by the President and the Govern-ment.

The ombudsman’s role is to pro-tect the rights and lawful interests of investors. His office will ex-plain those issues to the investors and hold hearings, consultations and protocol meetings with pub-lic authorities and organisations to address them, as well as interact with the heads or deputies of the interested public authorities and organisations as he considers the investors’ appeals.


Kazakh Team Wins category at africa Eco Race 2016

By Zhazira dyussembekova

asTana – Kazakh Kanat sha-girov and co-driver vitaliy yevtyek-hov won the cars category at the an-nual africa eco race 2016 on Jan. 10. They drove a Toyota Hilux Overdrive and represented the Mobilex racing team, reported vesti.kz.

It is the first time a Kazakh team has won an african rally. even though Shagirov and Yevtyekhov finished the last day in 23rd place, four min-utes and 41 seconds behind stage winner Philippe Gosselin (Optimus Md), in the overall standings they were 24 minutes and 48 seconds ahead of Pascal Thomasse (Optimus Md) from France with Mathieu ser-radori (Proto), from France as well, in third place.

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Astana to Host ‘Religions against Terrorism’ Conference in May

By Georg R. Vassilenko

asTana – Kazakhstan’s cap-ital will host an international conference titled “religions against Terrorism” in 2016 as the country continues efforts to strengthen dialogue among reli-gions and counteract extremist ideologies.

The event will be held May 31, 2016 on the eve of the 15th meeting of the secretariat of the Congress of the Leaders of World and Traditional religions. Par-liamentarians, representatives of world and traditional religions,

as well as experts are expected to participate. Organisers hope the forum becomes a new platform for dialogue among political and religious leaders, initiated by President nursultan nazarbayev in the framework of the Congress of the Leaders of World and Tra-ditional religions.

a planning meeting for the forum was held dec. 28 by Chairman of the senate of the Parliament of the republic of Kazakhstan and Head of the secretariat of the Congress of the Leaders of World and Tra-ditional religions Kassym-Jomart Tokayev.

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Uranium being transported out of Kazakhstan on board of a plane.

Geoglyphs, the Future of Kazakhstan Tourism?By Ronald LaPorte

There are only 12 countries where geoglyphs have been found. The geoglyphs in Kazakhstan are some of the largest, most frequent, oldest and beautiful. This makes them ideal to establish a geo-glyph tourist industry. This indus-try would help study and preserve these ancient structures. It would also be a boon to the economy of Kazakhstan to foster and expand eco and historical tourism.

The Kazakhstan geoglyphs were first reported in 2007 by Dmitry day and in 2015 became well recognized globally due to a new york Times article.

These geoglyphs are strung out across 1,000 km at the northern part of the country. They have been little explored with virtually no geoglyph tourism. now is the time to start to systematically plan for geoglyph tourism and study with

global interest for these geoglyphs at such a high level and expo 2017 nearing. Here we contrast the geo-glyph tourism industry with a simi-lar sized country, Peru, whose geo-glyphs are of similar size and age, however, geoglyph tourism in Peru is far advanced and very profitable.

Kazakhstan has a wonderful op-portunity to greatly expand the tourism industry with its wide ex-panse of natural, historical land-scape, modern architecture and friendly people. There is an excel-lent plan to build a thriving tour-ism industry by the year 2020. The

inclusion of the geoglyphs would help this to occur. Currently Ka-zakhstan is 85th on the world des-tinations for tourism out of 140. In terms of GdP the tourism industry represents 0.3 percent. estimates vary, but from 4.8-6.8 million visi-tors per year come to Kazakhstan. Most of the visitors are from rus-sia. The plan for tourism Industry development up to 2020, a goal was outlined of moving tourism GdP from 0.3 percent to 3 percent. Clearly, there is considerable inter-est; however, the numbers of visi-tors coming to Kazakhstan is still quite low with virtual no geoglyph tourists. The advantages of high-lighting geoglyphs in a tourism plan for Kazakhstan is that there is considerable interest in these an-cient artefacts, and Kazakhstan is one of only a handful of countries to have these.

We can compare Kazakhstan’s ge-oglyph tourism/ecotourism potential with Peru. Peru has the nazca line,

which is a string of geoglyphs made by ancient peoples 2,000 years ago.

The Peruvian government has em-braced these and has taken it upon themselves to establish itself as a very powerful tourist destination as seen with this tourism ad for Peru. some of the resources are feeding back to the study and preservation of geoglyphs. Peru is ranked consid-erably higher in tourism (58) on the world’s stage then Kazakhstan. What is important is that tourism also cap-tures a much bigger segment of the GdP in Peru, that of 7 percent. In the workforce, 10.8 percent of the work-ers are in the tourist industry. also, very significant, tourism is the fast-est growing industry in Peru, at an amazing rate of 25 percent per year.

Ideally, geoglyph tourism in Ka-zakhstan could grow as rapidly as what has been developed in Peru. In terms of geoglyph tourism in Peru, there are 160,000 visitors a year to see the geoglyphs.


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Wednesday, January 13, 2016

NATIONnaTIonaL

nEWS In BRIEFnazarbayev approves Ethics code for civil ServantsBy Zhazira dyussembekova

asTana – Kazakh President nursultan nazarbayev signed a decree dec. 29 approving a code of ethics for public employees. The code became effective Jan. 1 and an ethics commissioner will be introduced as an additional duty in almost all state bodies.

Previously known as the code of honour, the new document aims to strengthen society’s confidence in public authorities, form a strong culture of mutual relations in civil service and pre-vent unethical behaviour of civil servants. It establishes basic re-quirements for the moral and ethical image of civil servants, as well as basic standards of behav-iour, reported Kapital.kz.

The ethics commissioner will be introduced into the central ex-ecutive bodies and state bodies and be directly subordinate and

accountable to the President (with the exception of law enforcement and special state agencies) and akims (governors and mayors) of regions, cities and the capital. The commissioner’s functions will be assigned to the public servant who has earned the recognition and re-spect of the team.

according to the ethics code, public employees should con-tribute to strengthening of the

unity of Kazakhstan’s people and ethnic harmony in the country; respect the state and other lan-guages, traditions and customs of the people; be honest, fair and modest; follow generally accept-ed moral and ethical standards and be polite and correct with citizens and colleagues.

Civil servants should improve their skills and qualifications for the effective performance of their

duties and comply with the restric-tions and prohibitions written in Kazakh law.

state employees, including management, should not openly demonstrate their religious beliefs in the team nor force subordinate employees to participate in the activities of public and religious associations or other non-profit or-ganisations.

The code also provides the rules of behaviour related to public ap-pearances, including in the media. In particular, civil servants should not publicly express their opinions on matters of public policy and performance if they are not con-sistent with the basic directions of state policy, disclose proprietary information which is not author-ised for disclosure or make unethi-cal statements addressed to the of-ficials of the state, government and other public servants.

If the public servant receives unwarranted public accusations of

corruption, he should take meas-ures on their refutation within one month from the date of discovery of such charges.

standards of behaviour are also set for off-duty individuals. Civil servants must adhere to generally accepted moral and ethical stand-ards to prevent cases of antisocial behaviour, including being intoxi-cated in public places, offending human dignity and public morals. They should also be showing mod-esty and not emphasising and us-ing their official position in receiv-ing services.

Managing public employees should set an example to their subordinates by their behaviour, impartiality, equity, selflessness, respect for honour and dignity of the individual; ensure compliance with the principles of meritocracy and not have preferences on the basis of kinship, communities and personal loyalty in human resourc-es matters.

Healthcare Budgeting in Kazakhstan Seeks Ways to Improve


asTana – Healthcare and its performance on the proper level are one of the prerogatives of a developed state. In today’s world, facing crisis times, effectiveness of budgeting becomes one of the important measures of austerity. Healthcare is one of the biggest parts of a country’s budget, so it directly reflects on the whole sys-tem.

“Healthcare is the state activity to ensure citizens’ rights to life and health, which is regarded as one of the priorities in the politi-cal, economic and social life of the state and society. economic issues in healthcare are extreme-ly important at the moment. The cost of the health sector in Ka-zakhstan increased dramatically in 2004-2009. The increase was almost 400 percent comparing 131 billion tenge (us$381.5 million) in 2004 to 473 billion (us$1.38 billion) in 2009. Inpa-tient care as the most expensive in most countries amounted to more than 50 percent of the to-tal budget in Kazakhstan,” said Kazakh Centre for Healthcare standardisation deputy Head Temirkhan Kulkhan in a recent interview with The astana Times.

According to him, a significant part of the expenses of mod-ern healthcare goes on more ef-ficient, modern and expensive

technology for the hospital sec-tor. “However, such an infusion of investment in healthcare does not lead to the expected results. In addition, medical tourism in the search for the best diagnosis and treatment abroad becomes a more and more active pro-cess for our citizens every year. Projected health expenditures in Kazakhstan is characterised by steady growth, amounting to $6 billion in 2014 and followed by an expected 13.4 percent an-nual growth rate in the next four years to a level of $9.1 billion in 2017,” he added.

Kulkhan stressed that state ac-tivities in this regard, which are increasing the efficiency of budget expenditures and improving the

budgetary planning to provide more outcomes, are of paramount national importance.

“That is why Kazakhstan intro-duced the new Budget Code in 2009, which is focused on perfor-mance-based budgeting, covering all stages of the budget process. It has become a timely step in the progressive economic transforma-tions of the country,” he added.

according to him, taking into account the limited resources for healthcare, it is necessary to dis-cuss alternatives for financing new and more expensive medical tech-nologies. after all, even in those cases when medical technologies are cost effective, available re-sources can be distributed within equally or more profitable invest-

ments outside the health sector, such as the environment or edu-cation, with greater effect on the welfare of the population of Ka-zakhstan.

“achieving the optimal bal-ance between the price and qual-ity of the results of innovation in the health system acquires special importance for the state, where you have to know that the nomi-nal infusion of funds without the submission of the final results will not bring the desired health to the population,” he added.

In 2010, Kazakhstan introduced the Unified National Health System (unHs) to ensure free choice of hos-pital and competition among health organisations. according to the re-formers, it will serve as incentives to improve the quality of services and thus increase hospital income.

“Today, preparations for man-datory social health insurance are also underway, which is a mecha-nism of joint responsibility of the state, employers and citizens for in-dividual and public health, involv-ing the rejection of the ideology of dependency and the introduction of modern market mechanisms in healthcare,” said Kulkhan.

He also stressed that modern technologies provide tremendous opportunities for improvement and reorganisation of primary care based on new principles, based on knowledge and technology. “Internet, social networks, port-able medical devices, smartphones

and tablets, as well as medical ap-plications greatly expand access to medical technologies not only for doctors, but also for consum-ers. all this greatly democratises healthcare, ensuring close inter-action with consumers of medical care,” he said.

“It is important to carefully monitor the impact of such policy tools to keep track of the optimum financing of the industry with-out ignoring innovation. In addi-tion, such measures must not run counter to other aspects of health policies and practices that divert a significant part of healthcare costs, including initiatives to support healthy aging and improve the co-ordination of care for chronic pa-tients,” he concluded.

The national Centre of Health-care development’s centre for healthcare standardisation com-pares the technology costs, once implemented with the benefits to the welfare of the population. according to Kulkhan, it is much more efficient to carry out a com-parative study as a starting point to better understand which tech-nologies work best, which are the most cost-effective and under what circumstances. The study should also assess a wide range of poten-tial benefits outside the clinical or therapeutic benefit, including monetary value, improvements to the quality of care, quality of life, increased healthcare efficiency and greater opportunities for labour ac-tivity after receiving medical care. If such studies show a positive ef-fect on healthcare costs, they can be used to inform policymakers of the Kazakh Ministry of Health and social development, as well as research institutes and scientific centres.

Kazakh President nursultan nazarbayev attended the new year’s eve Charity Ball held at the duman entertainment Centre in astana on dec. 29. He congratu-lated everyone on the upcoming holiday and wished well-being, peace and accord to Kazakh citi-zens. all funds raised at the event were transferred to the Mercy foundation.

The new year’s Fantasies opened at the Pavlodar art Mu-seum, reported Kazakh Tv. The exhibition, presented by the Zhan-net nauruzova art studio, features 80 paintings adhering to the new year theme by more than 20 ama-teur artists. exhibition moderator Olga Paschko noted that in this difficult time everybody endures some hardships and art therapy is one of the healing methods that can provide help. she feels the therapy works when an artist takes paints, a blank canvas and paper and creates a fairy tale. Paschko emphasised that creativity with this unexpected result is just what the exhibition targets to show.

Major Kazakh mobile operator Kcell has optimised its network in astana and almaty, increas-ing data speeds and improving voice quality, reported Telecom-paper. The network optimisation was completed in several clusters in downtown almaty, as well as in astana and Karaganda, from January-november. The average data speed reached 1.9 Mbps on the Kcell network in november and the same month the company also deployed 18 new 3G base sta-tions and 28 GsM stations. voice services from the operator were expanded to the village of Taldy in the Karaganda region, Mynbulak in eastern Kazakhstan and Ivano-Petrovka in northern Kazakhstan. Mobile Internet coverage also ex-panded to four additional villages and Kcell increased the coverage of its 3G network in almaty, asta-na, shymkent, Kostanai, rudnyi, aksai, semey and Kyzylorda.

a charity ball was held in aktau on new year’s eve, according to Kazakh Tv. More than 200 under-privileged children took part in the event organised by the volunteers Club, which included local people of different professions and ages. volunteers dressed as foreign pop stars to entertain the children at the ball and the youngsters received new year gifts from ayaz ata (Kazakh santa Claus) and tried de-licious cakes. Charity fund direc-tor Iman dosmukhambetov said all the volunteers want the chil-dren from foster homes to feel the care and warmth of the people. He emphasised they should know the people need them, love and think about them.

a new year’s celebration was organised for more than 350 pa-tients of the national research Centre of Maternity and Child-hood in astana, reported Khabar Tv. They were given new year’s gifts collected across the coun-try. The organisers said the cen-tre received a number of presents and many people expressed their willingness to help the children. astana schoolchildren also staged a new year concert for the lit-tle patients. erekshe public fund deputy director Zoya Babkina said the event was organised thanks to generous and kind residents. she highlighted that despite the crisis and challenging situation in the state and frosty weather in the cap-ital, people are very kind-hearted.

a traditional festive tram was launched in Pavlodar ahead of the new year celebrations, reported 24KZ. Instead of conductors, pas-sengers were welcomed by ayaz ata (Kazakh santa Claus) and the snow maiden. Fairy tale characters congratulated city residents on the new year, joked and presented gifts to the most active passengers. natalya Knyazeva, who lives in Pavlodar, said the trip in the fes-tive tram made her happy and the fairy tale characters reminded her of her childhood.

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The second reform involves the transition from a five-level justice system (first, appeal, cassation, supervising and re-supervising) to a three-level (first, appeal and cassation) system. The aim is to strengthen foreign and domestic investors’ trust in Kazakhstan’s court system. The measures in-clude toughening qualification cri-teria for the recruitment of judges by introducing a new requirement for a candidate to serve at least five years within the court system and a one-year trial period for newly ap-pointed judges and improving the public image of police to increase the level of citizens’ trust and cut corruption. The reform seeks to ensure property rights by improv-ing conditions for entrepreneurial activity and protecting contractual obligations.

The reform foresees stricter qualification requirements and candidate selection process for ju-dicial posts as well as mandatory audio and video recording of all judicial processes and hearings.

The third reform involves meas-ures to increase industrialisation and economic growth, such as at-tracting at least 10 transnational corporations into the processing sector of the Kazakh economy. This reform also strengthens inves-tor protections, cuts red tape, sup-ports entrepreneurship and makes taxes more transparent. Customs and planning regulations are also to be streamlined and the electric-ity industry and transport links modernised. The ultimate goal is to strengthen the country’s middle

class as the backbone of economic and political development.

This will include the introduc-tion on Jan. 1, 2017 of universal tax declarations of incomes and expenditures for civil servants, which will be expanded to all citi-zens by 2020.

The third reform also includes changes to the Land Code meant to spur agricultural sector devel-opment. new regulations allow more than 224,000 agro-indus-trial entities to buy into private ownership 97.4 million hectares

of leased land. another 85.3 mil-lion hectares will be sold to indi-viduals and legal entities through auction for use in agricultural production.

also in line with the third re-form’s economic measures is an effort to reduce the shadow econo-my by allowing the return of prop-erty and money to legal circulation without fear of prosecution. This part of the reform began in 2014 and has now been extended to dec. 31, 2016.

The whole and partial priva-tisation of national assets, such as the National Scientific Medi-cal Centre, Kazakhstan Ghar-ysh sapary, International Centre for Cross-Border Cooperation Khorgos, astana International airport,national railway company Kazakhstan Temir Zholy, KazMu-nayGas, national atomic company Kazatomprom, KazPost, air asta-na, sanatorium arman and sanato-rium Kazakhstan, among others, is also part of the third reform.

The main goal of the fourth re-form is to further unite the nation by ensuring the middle class have

access to and experience a genuine rule of law and modern and valid political, economic and civil insti-tutions. The ideology of Mangilik el (The eternal nation) will serve as a system of common civic val-ues.

all work on identity and unity will be built around the assem-bly of the People of Kazakhstan (aPK), in existence since 1995.

The fifth reform involves in-creasing the transparency and ac-countability of the state. It seeks to minimise government’s role while empowering citizens.

This reform will involve the transition of 4,500 government functions into a more competi-tion-based model. a commission headed by the deputy prime minis-ter and including parliament mem-bers, heads of central executive bodies, representatives of the na-tional Chamber of entrepreneurs atameken and the Civil alliance of Kazakhstan will oversee the transition and monitor the perfor-mance of the functions.

“evolution and comprehensive-ness are the main principles of the modernisation process, which is now driving our history of in-dependence beyond its quarter-century anniversary. We must all remember that modernisation is successful only when the state is strong and the nation is united,” nazarbayev said in the article.

President details Reforms, ‘Path to the Kazakhstan dream’

Kazakh centre for Healthcare Standardisation deputy Head Temirkhan Kulkhan.

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eurAsIA&wOrldEXTERnaL

nEWS In BRIEF

Viktor Khristenko

Eurasian Economic commission to Welcome dialogue with European commission, Says outgoing chair


asTana – The eurasian eco-nomic union (eaeu) became a globally-recognised entity during its first year of operation and in 2016 will continue to strengthen and seek to have a concrete dia-logue with the european union, said outgoing eurasian eco-nomic Commission (eeC) Chair-man viktor Khristenko in a new year’s message. His comments, made dec. 31, were published on the eeC website.

“The first year of the fully-func-tioning eaeu has completed. at the same time, we completed the first four-year management cy-cle of the EEC, the first suprana-tional body in the eurasian space. In 2016, the second composition of the eeC board will begin its work,” he said, referring to the upcoming change of eeC leader-ship and his replacement with a representative from armenia.

In his words, the current pro-cesses are historic. In a short period of time, the commission was formed and began function-ing. Khristenko stressed in or-der to accelerate the integration processes on the Customs union

(Cu) stage, a great job was done in the spheres of economy, trade and technical regulation, customs administration and competitive policy.

“This allowed for the launching of the Common economic space (Ces); thereafter, by developing the necessary regulatory frame-work and doing a lot of work to deepen the integration, we climbed up to the level of the eaeu on Jan. 1, 2015. The EAEU signifies the transition to a single market with free movement of goods, services, capital and labour and formation

and implementation of approved policies in key sectors such as transport, industry, energy and ag-riculture, as well as coordination of macroeconomic policies and ensuring equal rights in the field of labour migration for citizens of the union,” said Khristenko.

He noted the eaeu launched a single market for services dur-ing the previous 12 months. The single market for drugs and medi-cal devices will occur in 2016 and the launch of a common energy market and a common oil and gas market are on the horizon.

Khristenko added the eaeu became a full-fledged subject of the international arena, forming its own trade and economic rela-tions with leading and promising economic centres such as China, egypt, India, Iran, Israel, vietnam and Latin america countries)and maintaining relations with the tra-ditional partners. In one year of existence, the eaeu expanded from founding members Belarus, Kazakhstan and russia to include armenia and Kyrgyzstan.

“I am convinced that the es-sential element of our long-term strategy of economic coopera-tion should be the direct dialogue between the eurasian economic Commission and the european Commission,” he said.

“all this time, in a close dialogue with the business communities of our countries, we have tried to make the supranational rules more effective than national, basing them on the best international practices, rules and standards of the World Trade Organisation (WTO)… We cannot say that we have done eve-rything we had planned for these four years. Moreover, we have al-ready enjoyed the benefits of the first steps of simplifying and har-monising procedures and removing

boundaries. It definitely had its pos-itive effects and I am sure that the current examples of problems and conflicts are the effects of under-integration,” he said in his message.

Khristenko added the eaeu has no political component and focuses on business interests, im-proving regulatory systems and reducing barriers. He explained that in the framework of the complex and conflicting global agenda, the world comes to multi-polarity. at the same time, every-one understands it is impossible to survive and be heard when you are alone. Thus, the players try to find a group which allows them to implement their own projects in the best possible way.

In this connection, developing a trend towards regionalisation is an attempt that allows finding new forms of interaction. The eaeu is moving with such a trend, said Khristenko.

“The future will depend on ef-fective internal structure of inte-gration unions and effective com-munication between them. The shape of the future world order will be born in this dialogue. The eaeu has all prerequisites to take a worthy place in it,” he added.

Kazakh President nursultan nazarbayev was awarded an order of the saint sergiy radonezhskiy by Patriarch Kirill for preservation of interfaith peace dec. 21 at the Cathedral of Christ the saviour in Moscow, reported rIa novo-sti. nazarbayev said he senses the award is the evaluation of his state’s policy in point of all reli-gions. He noted since the nation received its independence, equali-ty and respect for all religions have always been supported. The Presi-dent highlighted Islam and Ortho-doxy as the two pillars and basis of tolerance in Kazakh society.

The Kazakh government plans to purchase seven Su-30SM fighter aircraft, reported vedomosti. a cor-responding agreement will be con-cluded before the end of the year. Kazakhstan received its first four Su-30SM fighter aircraft in 2015 which were ordered the previous year. The agreement price is approx-imately $137 million. Kazakhstan became the first state in the Com-monwealth of Independent states which purchased new fighter aircraft after the collapse of the soviet un-ion and plans to purchase up to 24 Su-30SM fighter aircraft from Rus-sia, the newspaper said.

Kazakhstan plans to simplify visa procedures for the 34 member-states of the Organisation for economic Cooperation and development, as well as united arab emirates, sin-gapore, Malaysia and Monaco, re-ported Tengrinews. The citizens of each nation will be granted visa-free entry and have permission to stay in Kazakhstan up to 30 days from their date of entry. These actions are ex-pected to facilitate the creation of the astana International Financial Cen-tre, which will be established on the grounds of the eXPO 2017 facilities after the exhibition is held next year in astana. Kazakhstan plans to turn the astana International Financial Centre into an international finan-cial hub for the post-soviet space and take advantage of its favourable location at the crossroads between Western countries and asia.

Belarus passed the chairmanship of the eurasian economic union (eaeu) to Kazakhstan starting Jan. 1, according to Kazakh Tv. Kazakh President nursultan naz-arbayev has already noted 2016 will be difficult, but assured the state will make every effort to en-sure the eaeu develops and func-tions as successfully as in 2015. The five EAEU member-states have already agreed to completely switch to electronic declaration of goods movement across borders for the first six months of this year to protect the eaeu markets.

German deputy ambassador to Kazakhstan John Kramer congratu-lated the country’s people on the new year, wishing them all the best and success in 2016. Kramer high-lighted the important achievements of 2015, including the signing of the extended partnership and coop-eration agreement between Kazakh-stan and the european union (eu), reported strategy 2050. He said the agreement raises the relationship between the eu and Kazakhstan to a new level and will surely have a positive impact on German-Kazakh relations. Those political relations develop in the spirit of partnership and equality due to the high affin-ity of both parties. nearly 180,000 ethnic Germans currently live in Ka-zakhstan in peace and harmony.

astana, the capital of Kazakh-stan, will be developed as a busi-ness, cultural and scientific centre of eurasia. The formation of the international financial centre will enable the creation of more than 2,000 jobs, Kazakh President nur-sultan nazarbayev said in the arti-cle “The Plan of the nation – the Way to the Kazakhstan dream” published Jan. 6. nazarbayev con-siders the measures included in the Plan of the nation economic bloc provide for the attraction of at least 10 multinational corporations in the processing sector of the Kazakh economy. Work to create joint ventures with “anchor inves-tors” will encompass three groups of domestic companies in the man-ufacturing industry, infrastructure, energy drinks and others.

US Thanks Kazakhstan for assistance in Implementing nuclear deal with Iran


asTana – u.s. secretary of state John Kerry thanked Kazakh-stan along with other countries for their contribution in the imple-mentation of Iran’s nuclear deal on dec. 28.

In a statement released by the department of state, Kerry praised progress in the implementation of the deal brokered in July 2015.

“Kazakhstan contributed signifi-cantly to this effort as well, provid-ing some of the natural uranium material that Iran has received in exchange for its enriched mate-rial, and helping to facilitate the shipment. Kazakhstan’s contribu-tion builds on its hosting of early rounds of the P5+1 (China, France,

russia, the uK, the u.s. + Germa-ny) talks that led to the successful conclusion of the JCPOa.”

JCPOa stands for Joint Compre-hensive Plan of action, agreed to in mid-July. In 2013, almaty, Kazakh-stan’s largest city, hosted two rounds of P5+1 talks with Iran which con-tributed to the resumption of talks after a lengthy stalemate.

Kerry also spoke with Foreign Minister of Kazakhstan erlan Id-rissov to convey the thanks of the u.s. for all of these efforts.

“a number of commercial trans-actions made this shipment possi-ble, with many countries playing important roles in this effort. rus-sia, as a participant in the JCPOa and a country with significant ex-perience in transporting and secur-ing nuclear material, played an es-

sential role by taking this material out of Iran and providing natural uranium in exchange,” Kerry not-ed adding that in addition to Ka-zakhstan, azerbaijan also played a key role in facilitating the ship-ment.

another country recognised by Kerry was norway.

“I also want to extend the sincere and full gratitude of the united states to the Kingdom of norway, a country long committed to non-proliferation and a country that matches that commitment with ac-tions,” the u.s. top diplomat said. “In this vitally important case, norway contributed critical fund-ing to the commercial transactions involved in reducing the amount of enriched uranium in Iran, and also provided expertise in man-

aging some of these transactions. These efforts represent a signifi-cant contribution by norway to a safer world, and the collaboration between the u.s. and norway in this endeavor continues a long history of cooperation on non-proliferation of nuclear material. I spoke today with Foreign Minister Brende to thank him personally for his leadership in this area.”

a ship departed Iran for rus-sia carrying over 25,000 pounds (11,340 kgs) of low-enriched ura-nium. The shipment included the removal of all of Iran’s nuclear material enriched to 20 percent. This was a great step for Iran in order to meet its commitment to have no more than 300 kg of low-enriched uranium by Implementa-tion day.

“Implementation day will come when the International atomic en-ergy Agency (IAEA) verifies that Iran has completed all of these nuclear commitments, which in-crease Iran’s breakout time to ob-tain enough nuclear material for a weapon to one year, up from less than 90 days before the JCPOa,” Kerry said.

The secretary also stated, “The Iaea now must verify that Iran’s enriched uranium stockpile is 300 kg or less, as well as confirm that Iran has met all of its other key nuclear steps in the JCPOa be-fore Implementation day can oc-cur. These steps include removing much of Iran’s uranium enrich-ment infrastructure. Iran also must remove and render inoperable the existing core of the arak reactor, effectively cutting off Iran’s pluto-nium pathway to a nuclear weap-on. We will continue to consult closely with both the Iaea and other P5+1 members as we move toward verification by the IAEA that Iran has met all of its key nu-clear commitments.”


at the initiative of nazarbayev, in 2013 almaty hosted two rounds of talks in 2013 on Iran’s nuclear programme, which con-tributed to the resumption of ne-gotiations between the P5+1 and Iran. “We are proud that the re-sults of those two rounds of talks in almaty served as a foundation

for the JCPOa adopted two years later,” the Kazakh leader said in his statement.

astana also signed an agreement in august with the Iaea to host a low-enriched uranium bank in Ka-zakhstan which, once established, will make an important contribu-tion to strengthening the security of the international nuclear fuel cycle. The agreement follows decades of

global non-proliferation efforts by the Kazakh government.

“We believe that strict implementa-tion of the agreements achieved be-tween the P5+1 and Iran in July 2015 will further strengthen the nuclear non-proliferation regime, as well as ensure implementation of legal and absolute rights of every member state of the Treaty on the non-Proliferation of nuclear Weapons (nPT) to develop

peaceful nuclear activities provided they fully observe the provisions of the nPT, the safeguards agreement with the Iaea and the additional protocol to it,” the statement informed.

Thanks to the constructive coop-eration of various parties involved, agreements between the interna-tional community and Iran have now begun to be implemented.

“such cooperation could be the

prologue of a new paradigm of re-lations on the global level charac-terised by trust and a desire to seek successful solutions for complex problems peacefully,” nazarbayev said in his statement.

In september 2015, the Kazakh President told the 70th session of the un General assembly that he believes the creation of a world without nuclear weapons should become the main goal of humanity in the 21 century.

“In Kazakhstan, we are con-vinced that the goal of building a world free from the nuclear threat is achievable only through the strong political will of all states,” nazarbayev said dec. 30.

Kazakhstan Supports, Participates in Realising Iran nuclear deal

astana condemns north Korea’s nuclear TestBy Galiaskar Seitzhan

asTana – Kazakhstan’s For-eign Ministry moved quickly to deplore the announcement by the democratic People’s republic of Korea (dPrK) that it had suc-cessfully conducted a hydrogen bomb test on Jan. 6.

as expressed in the statement issued on the same day, “Ka-zakhstan strongly condemns and deems unacceptable such actions of dPrK,” which it said violate a number of the un security Council resolutions, namely 1718 (2006), 1874 (2009), 2087 (2013) and 2094 (2013).

The statement referred to the Central asian nation’s co-presi-dency with Japan in a major non-

proliferation forum, the ninth article XIv Conference of the Comprehensive nuclear Test Ban Treaty (CTBT), as an additional responsibility for Kazakhstan to raise its voice against nuclear tests.

“Kazakhstan believes dPrK’s actions seriously undermine the international community’s ef-forts along the path of nuclear disarmament and strengthening the non-proliferation regime and global security in general, as well as the efforts of the ma-jority of the countries in the world to ensure the early entry into force of the CTBT,” the ministry stated.

The country’s moral authority on nuclear security stems from its voluntary renunciation of the

nuclear arsenal it inherited from the soviet union in the early 1990s.

Kazakhstan’s Foreign Ministry called upon dPrK to follow suit by abandoning nuclear weapon ambitions and returning to a ta-ble of negotiations on its nuclear issue in the six-party format in-volving China, russia, the united states, the republic of Korea and Japan.

The statement also reflected Kazakhstan’s long-standing argu-ment that global security can only be guaranteed if humanity gets rid of all nuclear arsenals.

“It is the goal that our nation and President nursultan naz-arbayev have consistently called upon the international community to embrace and to reach, includ-

ing President nazarbayev’s call for humanity to make the world without nuclear weapons its ma-jor goal in the 21st century,” the statement concluded.

around 1.5 million of Kazakh-stan’s 17-million population were affected by the soviet nuclear weapon testing at the semipalat-insk nuclear test site in eastern Kazakhstan. It was shut down by nazarbayev’s decree on august 29, 1991, when the soviet union was still in place. Today the date is marked as the International day against nuclear Tests, estab-lished by a un General assembly resolution in 2009.

north Korea conducted its fourth nuclear detonation in the late morning hours of Jan. 6. The underground test was carried out

at the Punggye-ri nuclear test site in the north-eastern part of the Korean Peninsula, the external sources confirmed. The U.S. and Chinese seismological centers re-ported there was an earth tremor with a magnitude of between 4.9 and 5.1 at the time.

north Korean media announced a few hours later that the coun-try’s military had successfully tested a hydrogen bomb. Interna-tional experts, however, doubted Pyongyang’s claims. some sourc-es say the test was more likely of a boosted fission weapon, which uses hydrogen fusion to produce smaller, lighter warheads that are usable in arming a delivery de-vice such as a missile, rather than to create destructive power of a real hydrogen bomb.

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doSSayEV: “on dec. 25, we adopted a new comprehensive privatisation plan for 2016-2020 with a new list of companies. We hope that the central state and local executive bodies will be primarily focused on development of competition and support of the private capital during the next three years.”

Kazakhstan Continues to Increase Gold

ReservesBy dmitry Lee

asTana – Kazakhstan, rus-sia and Turkey continue increas-ing gold reserves, The Washington Post and Bloomberg reported on dec. 21, citing the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

For Kazakhstan, november has been the 38th straight month main-taining an upward trajectory in gold reserves. The country increased its reserves from 6.69 million ounces in October to 7.03 million ounces in november.

“The buying trend will contin-ue,” analyst at Barclays Plc Feifei Li said as quoted by The Wash-ington Post with Bloomberg by e-mail before the data was released. according to Li, emerging market countries such as russia, China and Kazakhstan “have a long-term need to increase their reserves due to portfolio and strategic reasons.”

The newspaper noted, “Central banks and other institutions boost-ed bullion purchases in the third quarter to the second highest on

record to diversify their assets, ac-cording to the World Gold Council. Kazakhstan has about 27 percent of its reserves in gold, while rus-sia has 13 percent and China about 2 percent. Top holder u.s. has 73 percent of its reserves in the metal, council data show. Bullion for im-mediate delivery sank to $1,046.44 an ounce on dec. 3, the lowest since February 2010, and was at $1,077.95 on Tuesday, accord-ing to Bloomberg generic pricing. Gold doesn’t pay interest, damping its allure at a time of rising borrow-ing costs.”

according to open sources, it has been estimated that all the gold mined by the end of 2011 totalled 171,300 tonnes; one tonne of gold has a value of approximately $48.2 million.

as of december, the u.s. has the world’s highest gold reserves at 8.1 million tonnes, followed by Germany with 3.3 million. The IMF has 2.8 million, and both Italy and France are at 2.4 million. Ka-zakhstan is in the 23rd place with 216.300 tonnes.

mazhilis approves $1 Billion Loan from asian development Bank

By yerbolat Uatkhanov

asTana – a $1 billion loan will be provided to Kazakhstan by the asian development Bank, reported Tengrinews. deputies of the Mazhilis (lower house of Par-liament) approved a draft law “On Ratification on Loan Agreement” (Ordinary Operations) between Kazakhstan and the asian devel-opment Bank at plenary meeting on dec. 23.

“The loan will be granted to Kazakhstan for five years. Three years are considered preferential. These funds will be focused on the social liabilities of our state, programmes, activities and pro-jects, which are provided for in the budget of the republic of Kazakh-stan. The main objective, which is currently being realised, is to pro-

mote the economy and stimulate economic development in asia by investing in the infrastructure sector of our country. The interest rate is minimal. I believe it will not have any negative impact on our

country. We consider it a widely used process in international prac-tice,” Member of the Mazhilis Maulen ashimbayev said, accord-ing to Tengrinews.

“The loan will be used to cover

the deficit of the national budget for the support of programmes ap-proved by the government. These funds will be aimed at the priorities of the domestic economy to enhance the strategic objectives of economic competitiveness. The amount of this loan will be used in January 2016. Logistics, transport and energy is-sues will become priority sectors of this financing,” Minister of National economy of Kazakhstan yerbolat dossayev emphasised.

Kazakhstan’s Ministry of Fi-nance will be responsible for ser-vicing and repayment of the loan using funds from the budget ac-cording to the financial terms and conditions specified in the loan agreement.

elsewhere, Chairman of the Mazhilis Kabibulla dzhakupov recently summarised the work of the deputies for the year. The level

of productivity of the deputies was very high in 2015, he said. They approved 158 out of 210 bills. In addition, he made clear that every newly elected representative is the so-called “drive” to initiate new laws. “For instance, in 2015 the dep-uties initiated 25 laws in comparison with the number of laws in 2013 and 2014 (10 and 14 laws respectively were initiated). any stagnation in the legislation work shall not be al-lowed because we don’t have any right for that,” he emphasised.

“It is very important to be a sus-tainable and reliable platform for the support of our President in up-dating the process of both the na-tion and the state for improving the work of the legislative base,” the chairman of the Mazhilis said.

The agreement of the asian In-frastructure Investment Bank has been approved by the deputies. Fifty-seven countries of the bank (including Kazakhstan) signed it in June.

With this agreement, Kazakhstan will become one of the funding countries in the asian Infrastruc-ture Investment Bank, according to Kazakh Tv.

Government approves new Privatisation Plan for 2016-2020

By Kseniya Voronina

asTana – Kazakhstan has ap-proved a new list of privatisations in the public and quasi-public sec-tors, including shares of the 65 largest national companies that are part of holdings such as samruk Kazyna sovereign Wealth Fund, Baiterek and Kazagro. The deci-sion was announced during the so called government hour, a report by the cabinet to the Parliament, on dec. 28, 2015.

“On dec. 25, we adopted a new comprehensive privatisation plan for 2016-2020 with a new list of companies. We hope that the central state and local executive bodies will be primarily focused on develop-ment of competition and support of the private capital during the next three years,” Minister of national economy yerbolat dossayev said dec. 28.

a list of 173 subsidiaries and af-filiates included in the Samruk Ka-zyna fund was also approved. The ministers updated the current list of 545 organisations to be transmitted

to the competitive environment as a result of privatisation, public-private partnership or liquidation.

Plans are underway to develop a new law regulating the abolition of preferential rights for all types of shareholders to acquire the assets being disposed in the quasi-public sector, said dossayev. He noted the large-scale privatisation is a number one priority of the government for 2016 and drew attention to the fact

the programme will last until 2020.The minister noted that the book

value, which contains the assets and the fair market value, don’t match.

“This proposal was supported by

the head of state and the deputies so that we can find investors who are willing to implement a large invest-ment programme. We have also set the task that packages must be sold at a rate of no less than 25 percent; and for those companies which al-ready have a private investors’ share at a rate of 50 percent or higher,” he said.

In addition, three types of sales of state-owned assets and assets of the

quasi-public sector have been identi-fied.

“The first type is to conduct auctions when 100 percent of the package is exhibited. The second type will be implemented by direct negotiations. We have introduced corresponding limitations – the auction can only be held three times (according to the english method with price increase). The last type is the dutch method of auctions with price reduction. In case there is no interest, a com-pany or assets must be liquidated,” said dossayev.

The minister stressed great atten-tion will be paid to the development of the astana International Finance Centre. It is expected that part of the share packages in the initial public offering will be brought to trade at the aIFC starting Jan. 1, 2018.

Economy minister discusses oil Sector with Parliament, Says Petrol Prices Stable

By Zhaniya Urankayeva

Minister of national economy yerbolat dossayev addressed the state of the country’s oil sector in remarks to Parliament, saying pet-rol prices in the country are stable.

“Indeed, after the deregulation, the aI-92 gas price hasn’t been reduced. However, in light of the transition to a free-floating ex-change rate of the tenge, the price didn’t go up either. you know, we have a lot of discussion on this topic. We allowed all exporters importing essential oil products to the country. summing up the results of the year 2015, I can say petrol prices are stable. I think,

these are the first positive steps we have made,” the minister said on dec. 28.

Dossayev also said that oil refin-ery upgrades will be accelerated.

“number one priority for us is to accelerate the modernisation process of all three refineries [in the country]. We hope that with all the adjusted plans, the works at atyrau will be com-pleted in december – January. during the visit of the Kazakh Prime Minister to China, it was decided to execute projects to-gether with the Kazakhstan de-velopment Bank and the [Chi-na’s] eximbank. Therefore, by 2018, Kazakhstan will be able

to locally produce all necessary oil products,” said dossayev.

Kazakhstan has three refineries, located in atyrau, Pavlodar and shymkent, with China having sig-nificant interests in the Atyrau and shymkent plants.

The minister also told Parlia-ment that commercial production at the Kashagan field is set to begin in late 2016 – early 2017, that the expansion of the Caspian Pipeline Consortium had been completed, that in april 2016 active realisa-tion of Tengizchevroil Future ex-pansion Project will begin, while the Beineu – Bozoi – shymkent gas pipeline is expected to be com-pleted by december 2017. yerbolat dossayev

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Kazakhstan has begun increasing salaries, pensions and social ben-efits as of the start of 2016, reported Kazakh Tv. The amount of pension payments has been increased by 9 percent and the amount of the basic payments has been raised as well, reaching 11,965 tenge (us$34.68). The minimum payment for retirees is now 37,789 tenge (us$109.53). The government has also increased the amount of social benefits, sala-ries for civil servants and scholar-ships. doctors, for instance, re-ceived a pay raise from 7- 28 percent depending on their qualifications and work experience. Teachers’ salaries increased by 15-29 percent. employees of other social sectors got pay raises from 28-40 percent. scholarships will be increased 25 percent.

The ferry complex in Kuryk port will be commissioned in 2016, ac-cording to Khabar Tv. The Mangys-tau region administration plans to open the largest ferry complex in the port, making the area a regional hub in southwestern Kazakhstan. The con-struction is scheduled and exploration of the waters in the bay that required drilling 113 wells has been completed. The project to fortify the bottom is being prepared and excavations were conducted to line up the surface for future rail and road access with the adjacent territory. Mangystau region deputy Governor rakhimbek amir-zhanov said the Borzhakty–yersai railway line will become an important infrastructure facility, supporting off-shore oil operations. The project was financed with 10 billion tenge (US$29 million) under the nurly Zhol pro-gramme.

a new house building plant was launched in Kyzylorda, reported Ka-zakh TV channel. The first factory started producing precast concrete products for construction of large houses. The company was financed under the state Programme for ac-celerated Industrial and Innovative development, with approximately 1.5 billion tenge (us$4.3 million) allocat-ed from the national budget to imple-ment the project. The factory created about 60 new jobs. Mechanical tech-nician nurmakhan nurbekov said the factory staff started to produce flights of stairs and the facility can build pre-fabricated houses in record time. Gen-eral director Murat Zhakhanov high-lighted the company plans to construct frame-panelled buildings, which are very warm and cost 20 percent less.

Kazakhstan landed 42nd place in the World economic Forum ranking of global competitiveness, accord-ing to the Prime Minister’s website. The most important factors for the country are increasing the share of the private sector in the GdP and creating new jobs, improving the institutional system, innovation, de-veloping policies to support compe-tition in the market, attracting direct foreign and domestic investment, raising productivity growth level and expanding the domestic and external markets. The World eco-nomic Forum uses more than 110 indicators to determine a nation’s competitiveness ranking.

Kazakh Minister of national economy yerbolat dossayev said dec. 28 the preliminary cost of the project to expand oil production at Tengiz field (second stage) is esti-mated at $30 billion, reported Tass news agency. The project is tar-geted at increasing the recoverable amount of hydrocarbons to 38 mil-lion tonnes per year by 2021.

Kazakh Minister of national economy yerbolat dossayev cre-ated a package of proposals to optimise customs duties in accord-ance with the 0-5-12 model, taking into account the nation’s condi-tions in the World Trade Organisa-tion (WTO), according to strategy 2050. The Ministry reported Ka-zakhstan uses the global rules and standards of doing business, which are more liberal and require equal conditions for all WTO members to avoid protectionist measures in relation to the domestic industry, including the use of customs and tariff regulation as a tool to protect the domestic market. That is why the 0-5-12 model, which involves only three sizes of import duties (zero percent, five percent and 12 percent), would be implemented.

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KazmunayTeniz, Rosneft Resume Exploration Works in the caspian Sea

By Staff Report

The press service of the Kazakh Ministry of energy has recently announced plans to carry out ad-ditional exploration works in the Kurmangazy oil field located in the Caspian sea.

according to the statement, the abandoned wells are going to be re-monitored and proposals on additional extraction works in the field to be scheduled soon. It was also announced that no production activities, including drilling and

seismic surveys were implemented in the Kurmangazy oil field during 2015.

The field was developed on the ba-sis of the Production sharing agree-ment (Psa) type contract concluded between the KazMunayTeniz and rosneft companies. Two exploration wells were drilled in the field in 2006 and 2009. Both didn’t reveal any signs of oil despite the positive pre-liminary forecast, which evaluated the Kurmangazy deposit as prom-ising and able to expose billions of tonnes of oil reserves. after that, it was decided to close the project.

The ministry, however, not-ed that the decision to stop the project hasn’t been made on the governmental level between Ka-zakhstan and russia, so that the contract remains in force. during an intergovernmental commis-sion meeting in 2014, the parties came to the decision to resume exploration works.

The Kurmangazy probable reserves’ estimates 2.8 billion tonnes of standard fuel, which is to be found in deep-Paleozoic sedi-ments. such exploration works are usually associated with high risks.

The process of privatisation of state companies and its oppor-tunities were highlighted at the second round of negotiations be-tween Kazagro vice Chairman aidarbek Khodzhanazarov and the heads of al dahra agrarian Hold-ing and agthia from the united arab emirates. The meeting was held in abu dhabi with the as-sistance of the Kazakh embassy to the uae, reported Bnews.kz. The first round of negotiations was held Oct. 28 in astana at the Ka-zakhstan-emirates business forum and brought together more than 20 major agricultural and industrial companies and investment funds from the uae.

Kazakhstan’s airport Man-agement Group and argentina’s Global Pro signed a memoran-dum of cooperation dec. 25 to construct a waste processing plant at astana International airport, according to Bnews.kz. The memorandum was inked under the conditions of the Basel Convention on control of cross-border transportation of danger-ous wastes and their removal. Global Pro showed its own inten-tion to invest in the astana air-port during the september visit to argentina by astana eXPO 2017 Commissioner and First deputy Minister of Foreign affairs rapil Zhoshybayev. The amount of the investment is $10 million. The project is aimed at organising waste processing at the airport, minimising cross-border move-ment of dangerous wastes and establishing a zoo-phytosanitary barrier to reduce negative impact on the environment.

The new excise tax on alcohol will provide the state budget with an additional 4.6 billion tenge (us$13.3 million). Beginning Jan. 1, the excise tax for one litre of 100 percent alcohol is 1,380 tenge (us$4). The tax is 15 percent more than in 2015.

Kazakh producers such as Lo-comotive Kurastyru Zauyty and Kazakhstan Temir Zholy have doubled the range of railroad products, reported Bnews.kz. Kazakhstan recently created a railway engineering branch that rapidly increases local content, improves technology transfer and exports goods. Kazakhstan Temir Zholy localisation is currently 23 percent and there are plans to reach 60 percent by 2017. Loco-motive Kurastyru Zauyty has a 32-percent localisation level and has produced 296 diesel locomo-tives during the last five years. It plans to increase the localisation level to 53 percent. Locomotives are presently exported to azer-baijan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and ukraine.

samruk-Kazyna real estate Fund, which has operated in the national real estate market for more than six years, has commis-sioned facilities with a total area of approximately 1.4 million square metres, according to Bnews.kz. nearly four million new jobs in 11 regions were created due to the fund’s operation. samruk-Kazyna real estate Fund constantly in-creases the level of local content for its own projects, which in 2015 reached 80 percent. The fund has fulfilled the plan to implement the 2015 programme for housing construction up to 150,000 square metres.

almaty line light rail (LrT) will carry more than 60,000 passengers a day, reported Ka-zinform. almaty development Centre, IdOM Consortium Consultants and norton rose started preparing a concession for LrT construction after sign-ing an agreement. Its length will be 22.9 kilometres. The almaty 2020 development programme will ensure the development of the surrounding areas, includ-ing the business sector. In addi-tion to the positive impact on the main streets (obviating the need for up to 25,000 vehicles a day), the LrT will crucially improve environmental conditions as one of the fundamental factors in the transition to a green economy.


The office will analyse the ap-peals and results of the hearings, study the legislation and determine the regulations that violate the in-vestor’s rights or hinder conduct-ing business and, based on the results, make recommendations to restore the rights and interests. The results will be submitted to the relevant public authority and/or official whose actions/inactions violated the investor’s rights and interests, and recommendations will be made to restore them.

The office will also hear appeals from investors, assist them with extra-judicial and pre-trial orders and propose investor-related legis-lation, among other duties.

More than 50 applications from foreign and domestic investors have already been considered, al-most 65 percent with positive re-sults, according to the Ministry for Investment and development. The remainder are in process.

an investor’s appeal should comply with the following rules. The individual shall state his or her name, mailing address and the nature of the appeal. a legal entity shall state the name, legal address, reference number and date of the appeal. The appeal shall be signed by the investor or his legal repre-sentative or certified by electronic digital signature.

In the case of filing a complaint regarding violated rights and law-ful interests, the appeal shall in-clude the name of the subject or position, surnames and initials of officials and motives and require-ments of the appeal. The appeal shall be accompanied by docu-ments and other materials confirm-ing the investor’s requirements.

The appeal shall be considered by the investment ombudsman within 30 calendar days from the date of receipt. If necessary, he will request additional information from public authorities and organi-sations, except information consti-tuting a state or commercial secret.

He may recommend the investor apply to the prosecutor’s office to inspect the legality of the decision made by the public authority or or-ganisation. If the investor’s ques-

tions cannot be solved in accord-ance with the current legislation, the ombudsman may submit rec-ommendations to the government to improve the legislation.

The new year will also see a streamlined process for investors applying for licenses and permits. rather than the need to visit vari-ous ministries and government agencies, their interaction with authorities will be consolidated through the Investor service Cen-tre. The one-stop shop approach will facilitate investment activities and reduce administrative and bu-reaucratic barriers.

Piloted in 2015, the centre has been providing public services to investors implementing priority projects. The key elements, devel-oped in collaboration with Price-waterhouseCoopers, include busi-ness processes and step-by-step roadmaps in major industries to organise and provide a legal struc-ture for investors’ activities. The centre held 200 meetings last year and expects to issue more than 363 permits and licenses. Its location on the first floor of Astana’s Trans-port Towers building helps facili-tate public services provisions for investors.

The success of the model has en-couraged expansion of the concept to cover all investors. The govern-ment is planning to implement the principle for rendering services to investors through public service centres in astana, almaty and the regions. Future automation and online service will be provided at www.baseinvest.kz, a database of investment projects and foreign investments. using the website, an investor will be able to regis-ter, obtain necessary information and apply and monitor the permit/license issuing process.

Investor confidence is an impor-tant element of the economic com-ponent of Kazakhstan’s efforts to transition into one of the world’s top 30 most developed nations by 2050, as called for by President nursultan nazarbayev. Invest-ment, both foreign and domestic, is also crucial to the country’s plan to diversify its economy, increase industrialisation and reduce its re-liance on energy-related sectors.

BI Group Receives altyn Sapa Presidential awardBy Kamila Zhumabayeva

asTana – BI Group, the larg-est investment and construction company in Kazakhstan, was the winner of the altyn sapa Presiden-tial award in “the best enterprise providing services” category and was presented with a diploma of the first degree, Tengrinews agen-cy reported dec. 14.

BI Group supervisory Council Chair Bauyrzhan Issabayev re-ceived the prestigious award from Timur Kulibayev, Presidium Chair of the national Chamber of entre-preneurs, in the presence of Presi-dent nursultan nazarbayev.

“It is a great honour to receive the Presidential award. Through-out twenty years, BI Group has paid particular attention to safe,

quality and timely implementation of its construction works. This is the result of many years of work and professionalism of a cohesive team,” said Issabayev.

More than 200 companies sub-mitted applications to compete for the high honour, which is present-ed for achieving significant results in terms of quality of products and services and safety provisions, as well as introducing high-quality management. BI Group passed the strict selection of the state com-mission and received maximum scores for all criteria, according to the agency.

BI Group is the first construction company to receive the prestigious prize. The requirements regarding quality of services are regulated by Kazakh legislation and other state and international standards, rules and reg-

ulations and the company’s divisions are certified according to an integrated quality management system.

as one of the leading compa-nies in the country, BI Group is widely represented in the residen-tial, civil, social, road and rail, industrial and infrastructural seg-ments of the construction indus-try, successfully implementing more than 80 projects throughout the nation. Kazavtozhol, naz-arbayev Intellectual schools, astana eXPO 2017 and Kazakh-stan Temir Zholy are among the major customers of the holding, reported Tengrinews.

The accolade was established Oct. 9, 2006 by Presidential de-cree no. 194 “On the competition for the altyn sapa award of the President of Kazakhstan with the aim to build the new economy of

Kazakhstan, the development of its own production and continu-ous quality improvement of goods and services.” It is the national

equivalent of the deming award, Malcolm Baldridge Quality award and european Quality award, ac-cording to Tengrinews.

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container Trains Begin operation along Lianyungang-duisburg Route

By Kamila Zhumabayeva

asTana – Kazakh Prime Min-ister Karim Massimov concluded his december 2015 visit to China by launching the first container train on the nation’s Lianyungang route, which continues through the territories of Kazakhstan, russia and Belarus and ends in duisburg, Germany, Kazakhstan Temir Zho-ly (KTZ) reported dec. 14 on its website. The project is one of the key undertakings in Kazakhstan’s new silk road state programme and nurly Zhol new economic policy. And it also fits perfectly with China’s own silk road eco-nomic Belt programme announced by President Xi Jinping

during the visit, the Prime Min-ister and Jiangsu Province Gover-nor shi Tayfen were familiarised with the work of the joint venture, the Kazakh-Chinese logistics ter-minal in the Lianyungang port, according to KTZ. The current

production activity on consoli-dating and processing goods was demonstrated to the distinguished guests, as well as opportunities for automating the control processes and monitoring all operations both in the terminal and along the route.

More than 190,000 contain-ers have been processed since the terminal began operation in July 2014. regular container service has been initiated on railway routes to Kazakhstan (almaty), Central asia (Tashkent) and the Caucasian region, the company reported.

Three container trains, with an increase to five, are expected to run each week beginning in 2016. By 2020, the organisational index of container trains in the direction of Kazakhstan and transit to eu-rope, Central asia and the Cauca-sus will reach 1,827 trains.

Lianyungang, an eastern har-bour of the Great silk road, is one of the 20 largest ports in the world. For Kazakhstan, it is one of the strategic units overseas, as it en-

sures the efficient development of the country’s transit and transport potential, according to Kapital.kz.

The Lianyungang port ensures cargo traffic in the direction of the dostyk-alashankou border cross-ing from countries of south east asia and south of China to Ka-zakhstan, Central asia and russia. The port transships more than 150 million tonnes of cargo a year, re-ported KTZ.

The negotiations in China in-cluded prospects of further expan-sion of beneficial cooperation in the trade, economic, transport and logistics fields and in particular, and the increase in freight traffic through the Kazakh-Chinese logis-tics park, according to Kazinform.

regular container service on the Lianyungang-almaty route began Feb. 25 in Jiangsu Province. The project was initiated by leaders of the two states, Kazakh President nursultan nazarbayev and Chi-nese President Xi Jinping, reported kapital.kz.

Kazakh Breeders Export Large yedilbayev Breed Sheep

By dmitry Lee

asTana – atyrau sheep stock breeders are growing 100-150 kilogramme sheep of the famous Kazakh yedilbayev breed, 24kz reports.

each sheep can give up to three kilogramme of wool, the media reports. The atyrau breeders man-aged to preserve the breed and are now targeting markets in neigh-bouring countries. These hefty, meaty animals are in demand in russia.

“We have been breeding for many years,” stock-breeder Gai-nulla adilov told the media. “The results can be seen today. For in-stance, the biggest livestock can be as heavy as 150 kilogrammes and average sheep weigh no less than 100 kilogrammes.”

even in soviet times, the best yedilbayev sheep were from the western part of Kazakhstan. Thanks to the efforts of local breeders there are some 12,000 sheep being grown at the breeding plant suyundyksky.

The weighing process involves three adult men, the breeders note; the sheep are resilient and have strong bone structure besides their impressive weight.

“I believe this breed survived thanks to its endurance,” senior

shepherd aslan nazhimedenov said. “These sheep can manage to forage alone in the wilderness all year. They can equally tolerate ex-treme heat and 40-degree winters. These factors greatly facilitate their maintenance.”

The demand for sheep meat is con-stantly growing, according to Zhan-bolat nugmanov, director of the farm. “since the eurasian economic union opened its borders, we have multiplied the number of our customers, expand-ing the territory for our products. Cus-tomers from russian neighbouring re-gions and the Caucasus come to us for the supply. This year we have already sold 4,000 sheep and 2,000 more are ready to be shipped,” nugmanov said.

The demand keeps growing, according to the managers of the farm, who are planning to export some 60 tonnes of meat in the first quarter of this year.

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Issekeshev AppointedInvestment Ombudsman,

One Stop Shop for Investors Expands

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edITOrIAl&OpINION

The AsTANA TImes

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Iran nuclear deal, Kazakhstan’s Role Were

Bright Spots in Difficult YearIn what was a very chal-

lenging year globally, the breakthrough over Iran’s nuclear pro-

gramme last summer was a rare high point. It was not just that the draft agreement paved the way for a decrease in tensions in such an important and volatile region– an urgent need for which we have wit-nessed again in the last few days with tensions flying high between saudi arabia and Iran – but the rich promise it held for the longer-term.

an improvement in rela-tions between such influential powers holds out hopes for cooperation on a host of other major problems. as we view the violence and chaos in so much of the wider region and world, no one can argue improved cooperation is not desperately needed.

On the economic front, too, the deal is very welcome news. any easing and, hopefully, eventual complete removal of sanctions on Iran will pro-vide a wide-ranging boost for trade, employment and prosperity. Wherever you look in the world, growth is being down-graded. The full integra-tion over time of Iran into the regional and global economy will provide a positive boost.

But the agreement also holds a wider and important lesson. For if progress could be made in a dispute where the stakes were so high and suspicions so deep and long-lasting, it shows how a determination to find a solution and good faith on all sides can overcome the seemingly most intractable of problems.

These benefits explain why everyone involved in the long negotiations deserves praise and why the signs of continued progress in putting the Joint Comprehensive Plan of action into place are so welcome. Our entire world will gain when the agreement fully comes into force.

Kazakhstan, of course, played a role in keeping the ne-gotiations on track. By hosting two rounds of talks between P5+1 (Britain, China, France, russia and the u.s. plus Germany) and Iran in almaty when the process had stalled, it gave all parties the opportunity to demonstrate they did not want to walk away but were intent on working through the difficulties blocking progress. It provided the platform and space for the historic break-throughs to be made later.

There is plenty of work to be done before the agreement meets all its goals. so it is no surprise that Kazakhstan, which, perhaps uniquely, can claim to have warm relations with all partners in the negotia-tions, was asked again to play what the Wall street Journal has described as “a signifi-cant role” in driving forward progress.

With the approval of the P5+1, Iran, the united nations and the International atomic energy agency (Iaea), Ka-zakhstan last month supplied Iran with natural uranium for its civilian nuclear programme. This was in compensation for the enriched uranium sent by Iran to russia – one of the most important agreement milestones passed so far.

The move is a reflection of the high confidence placed in Kazakhstan and its leadership. It also underlines the country’s long-standing determination to do all it can to prevent the pro-liferation of nuclear weapons and support each nation’s right, with full international safe-guards, to harness the potential of nuclear power to meet its energy needs.

These goals will also both be powerfully served by the deci-sion for Kazakhstan to host the Iaea’s low enriched uranium fuel bank on its territory. The Leu bank will enable countries to develop their own peaceful nuclear energy without fears that the uranium supplies might be disrupted for political reasons and without the need to develop their own enrichment capabili-ties, a critical factor that may be diverted for weapon develop-ments. The establishment of the Leu bank will raise trust across this whole sphere while help-ing countries deliver economic growth without raising emis-sion levels. In the long run, this could be among Kazakhstan’s most important contributions to a more peaceful, prosperous and stable world.

There are, of course, many obstacles still to overcome until the Joint Comprehensive Plan of action over Iran’s nuclear programme is fully in place. and there is no shortage of doubt-ers, including in both the united states and Iran, who believe the deal will not hold or that too much has been given away. But the progress so far and the mile-stones reached give real hope for the future. and that’s an optimis-tic message for 2016.

EaEU Poised for more Work in 2016 as Kazakhstan

assumes chairmanshipGiven that the idea of

the eurasian eco-nomic union (eaeu) was first proposed

more than two decades ago by President nursultan nazarbayev, 2015 was hardly the best year for the initiative to finally launch. Weakening global growth and falling oil prices meant difficul-ties for the countries involved and increased tensions between russia and the West fuelled sus-picions over how the trade block might develop.

These challenging times mean a considered verdict on what the eaeu can achieve will have to wait far longer than its first anniversary on Jan. 1, 2016. But as Kazakhstan took over the chairmanship for 2016, there are already hopeful signs for the organisation and its outward relations.

real progress, for example, has been made in putting in place institutions to run the eaeu. reforms have been introduced that will create a genuine single market to allow the free flow of goods, ser-vices, investment and skills. The founder members of russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus have already been joined by armenia and Kyrgyzstan.

This has increased the size of the market within the eaeu to 182 million consumers. unsur-

prisingly, the ability to access such a large market has already attracted the attention of other countries.

2015 saw the signing of the first bilateral free trade agree-ment with vietnam. Hopes are high that other countries will take similar steps in the coming months, including Israel with which talks are already under way. In fact, the first year has seen the eaeu already well on the way to becoming a fully-fledged member of the interna-tional community.

The new powerhouses of Chi-na and India, for example, have wasted no time in forging trade and economic relations with the eaeu, as have Iran, egypt, Israel and Latin america. The prospects in terms of increased trade as a motor for growth are exciting.

These relations show that those who feared the eaeu would look inwards rather than be open to the world have been proved wrong. This continued approach has been underlined by Kazakhstan’s accession to the WTO in 2015.

The last year has also eased concerns that economic integra-tion would inevitably lead to po-litical integration. as the chair-man of the eurasian economic Commission said last month, the eaeu is an economic project

without a political dimension. It is a partnership of sovereign nations whose focus is on how to improve the environment for businesses and investment and remove barriers to trade both within member countries and its outside partners.

as well as the improved bilat-eral links already being forged, it is important that cooperation with similar trading blocs is fostered. In every continent, we see countries coming together economically. It is a recognition that in today’s global economy, no nation – no matter how large or wealthy – can hope to thrive on its own.

Global prosperity depends not only on how effectively these blocs operate individually but how they work together. It is why the eaeu has made improving cooperation with the european union a top prior-ity. Putting in place the right foundation for this dialogue will be high on the agenda for Kazakhstan’s chairmanship over the next year.

It was never going to be the easiest of starts for the eaeu. But despite a difficult global environment and the hard work ahead, the fledgling organisation is beginning to find its feet. As every parent knows, that is the most important landmark in the first year.

Shakespeare Lives

By david cameron

This year’s four hundredth anniver-sary of the death of William shake-speare is not just an opportunity to commemorate one of the greatest play-wrights of all time. It is a moment to celebrate the extraordinary ongoing in-fluence of a man who – to borrow from his own description of Julius Caesar – “doth bestride the narrow world like a Colossus.”

shakespeare’s legacy is without par-allel: his works translated into over 100 languages and studied by half the world’s schoolchildren. as one of his contempo-raries, Ben Jonson, said: “shakespeare is not of an age, but for all time.” He lives today in our language, our culture and society – and through his enduring influ-ence on education.

shakespeare played a critical role in shaping modern english and helping to make it the world’s language. The first major dictionary compiled by samuel Johnson drew on shakespeare more than any other writer. Three thousand new words and phrases all first ap-peared in print in shakespeare’s plays. I remember from my own childhood how many of them are found for the first time in Henry V. Words like dis-hearten, divest, addiction, motionless, leapfrog – and phrases like “once more unto the breach”, “band of brothers” and “heart of gold” – have all passed into our language today with no need to reference their original context. shakespeare also pioneered innovative use of grammatical form and struc-ture – including verse without rhymes, superlatives and the connecting of ex-isting words to make new words, like bloodstained – while the pre-eminence of his plays also did much to standard-ise spelling and grammar.

But Shakespeare’s influence is felt far beyond our language. His words, his plots and his characters continue to inspire much of our culture and wider society. nelson Mandela, while a pris-

oner on robben Island, cherished a quote from Julius Caesar which said “Cowards die many times before their death, the valiant never taste of death but once.” While Kate Tempest’s poem “My shakespeare” captures the eternal presence of shakespeare when she wrote that shakespeare “…is in every lover who ever stood alone be-neath a window… every jealous whis-pered word and every ghost that will not rest.”

Shakespeare’s influence is every-where, from dickens and Goethe to Tchaikovsky, verdi and Brahms; from West side story to the Hamlet-inspired title of agatha Christie’s “The Mouse-trap” – the longest-running theatre production in London’s West end to-day. While his original plays continue to entertain millions – from school halls across the world to the overnight queues as hundreds scrambled for last minute tickets to see Benedict Cum-berbatch playing Hamlet at London’s Barbican last year.

But perhaps one of the most excit-ing legacies of shakespeare is his ca-pacity to educate. as we see from the outreach work of the royal shake-speare Company and shakespeare’s Globe and the impact of pioneering British charities like the shakespeare schools Festival, studying and per-forming shakespeare can help im-prove literacy, confidence and wider educational attainment.

every day throughout 2016, Brit-ain is inviting you to join us in cel-ebrating the life and legacy of Wil-liam shakespeare. On Jan. 5, Twelfth night, we launched “shakespeare Lives” – an exciting global pro-gramme of activity and events to highlight his enduring influence and extend the use of shakespeare as an educational resource to advance lit-eracy around the world.

The programme will run in more than seventy countries, led by the Brit-ish Council and the GreaT Britain

campaign. you can share your favour-ite moment of shakespeare on social media, watch never-before-seen perfor-mances on stage, film and online, visit exhibitions, take part in workshops and debates, and access new shakespearean educational resources to get to grips with the english language.

The royal shakespeare Compa-ny will tour China; shakespeare’s Globe will perform across the world from Iraq to denmark. young peo-ple will reimagine shakespeare in Zimbabwe. a social media campaign called “Play your Part” (#Playyour-Part) will invite the next generation of creative talent to produce their own digital tribute to the Bard – and, in partnership with the British char-ity voluntary services Overseas, we will raise awareness of the huge challenge of global child illiteracy and use shakespeare to increase edu-cational opportunities for children around the world.

Beyond the great gift of language, the bringing to life of our history, his ongoing influence on our culture and his ability to educate, there is just the immense power of shakespeare to inspire. From the most famous love story to the greatest tragedy; from the most powerful fantasy to the wittiest comedy; and from the most memo-rable speeches to his many legendary characters, in William shakespeare we have one man, whose vast imagina-tion, boundless creativity and instinct for humanity encompasses the whole of the human experience as no one has before or since.

so, however you choose to play your part, please join us in 2016 in this unique opportunity to celebrate the life and enduring legacy of this man; en-suring that, as he himself put it, “all the world’s a stage” and that through his legacy, truly, shakespeare Lives.

The author is the British Prime minister.

Wasserman city Hall

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OpINIONs

Plan of the nation – the Path to the Kazakhstan dreamBy nursultan nazarbayev

On Jan. 1, the practical phase of the implementation of the Plan of the nation “100 concrete steps on the im-plementation of the five institutional reforms” was launched. Fifty-nine laws entered into force and created completely new legal conditions for the development of the state, econo-my and society. It is important for us to evaluate this historically unprece-dented scale of change of our national legislation, particularly because they open a path towards reaching our Ka-zakhstan dream – to be among the top 30 countries of the 21st century.

Independent Kazakhstan was a cherished dream for many genera-tions of our ancestors.

We made these centuries-long dreams about a free and independent homeland come true.

new Kazakhstan dreamWe enter the 25th year of inde-

pendence with a new Kazakhstan dream, which reflects the main goal of the Kazakhstan 2050 strategy.

By the mid-21st century, we plan to place Kazakhstan among the 30 most-developed states of the world. This became a nationwide dream, which was supported by the absolute majority of the people of Kazakhstan during the early presidential elections in april 2015.

In fact, this nationwide vote of con-fidence was the historic birth of our nation of the Common Future.

We started our path to our new dream with the development of the Plan of the nation – 100 concrete steps on the implementation of the five institutional reforms.

They will create new conditions for the country’s development, economic growth and life improvement for all Kazakhs. They will be in line with the standards of the Organisation for economic Co-operation and devel-opment (OeCd).

Within the few months of 2015, a great job was done to create a legis-lative and organisational framework for the launch of the five institutional reforms.

It is important to see that the prac-tical work on implementation of the Plan of the nation is being carried out in full compliance with the changing global situation, taking into account both new opportunities and the pos-sible risks of international develop-ment. This is described in detail in my state-of-the-nation address to people of Kazakhstan on nov. 30, 2015.

The five institutional reforms are especially important at this stage when the Kazakh economy is strong-ly influenced by global economic challenges.

The new legislation helping Ka-zakhstan achieve high international development standards have already proven effective. Each of the five re-forms is supported by roadmaps, and we will consistently implement them.

Professional development of the State

Our first reform is aimed at increas-ing the effectiveness of the state ap-paratus based on the new law on civil service.

We were the first among post-Sovi-et countries to start the establishment of a new civil servants corps through competition and on principles of mer-itocracy.

now, a new development stage of the Kazakh civil service has been launched.

By decree, I have established the Ministry of Civil service affairs and the national anti-Corruption Bureau therein.

The new law on civil service adopt-ed simultaneously and interrelated with the new anticorruption legisla-tion defines the main framework of the updated civil service model and the algorithm of further actions on strengthening the effectiveness of the entire public administration system.

First, the career of an administra-tive civil servant will be built on his/her competence and obtained experi-ence.

second, an open competition and the decision of the national Commis-sion on Personnel Policy may allow recruiting non-governmental and for-eign managers into the civil service on a contractual basis.

Third, the legislation establishes a new salary payment system for civil servants based on their competences and the results of their activities de-pending on the character, load and results of their work.

It is planned to introduce such a system on Jan. 1, 2017. at the same time, salaries of civil servants, now comprising the corps B have been in-

creased beginning in 2016.Fourth, the law clearly defines the

principle of autonomy and stability of the state apparatus when political civil servants are changed.

Fifth, there are strict measures on preventing conditions leading to a breach of ethical norms and causing corruption among officials.

There is a new Code of ethics for civil service, which includes stand-ards of occupational and domestic conduct for civil servants.

sixth, an important aspect of the new law on civil service is related to the fact that its basic norms will cover law enforcement bodies.

seventh, with regards to the new law and after the introduction of the new salary payment system, it is planned to conduct a comprehen-sive attestation of administrative civil servants of corps B within the new qualification requirements.

Law and order and Rule of Law

The idea of the second reform is to ensure that independent justice and the entire law enforcement system of Kazakhstan are aimed only at re-specting the rights and freedoms of citizens, strictly implementing laws and strengthening law and order.

To ensure its legal framework, a new Civil Procedure Code and a Law on the supreme Judicial Coun-cil have been adopted. necessary amendments have been introduced to the Constitutional Law on the Judi-cial system and the status of Judges, Criminal Procedure Code and Code of administrative Offences.

The main issue in reforming Ka-zakhstan’s courts is the establishment of a high-quality judicial corps.

The selection process and appoint-ment of judges will be transparent and open for society.

In this regard, the supreme Judi-cial Council has been dramatically reformed.

The highest aspect of the judicial reform is the transition from a five-stage to a three-stage judicial system.

Only first, appeal and cassation instances are left. at the same time, the role of the first instance court and the court of appeal are considerably enhanced. They will hear most cases.

The system of justice in Kazakh-stan will be as open as possible with due account for the respect of citi-zens’ rights to privacy.

a number of institutional decisions will become effective within the judi-ciary reform.

First, the Court Jury under the su-preme Court will be significantly re-structured.

second, a specialised panel for the consideration of disputes will be es-tablished under the supreme Court, involving the participation of large investors.

Within its framework, the right of foreign investors to high-quality and fair resolutions of legal disputes will be exercised.

Third, a balance between prosecu-tion and defence should be achieved in criminal proceedings, including the pre-trial stage.

Fourth, it is important to remember that the heads of Kazakh courts are first among equals. Therefore, their possibilities to influence the decisions of other judges will be excluded.

Fifth, the institution of private court bailiffs is further developed with the gradual reduction of state court bailiffs.

additionally, we need to ensure that all law enforcement bodies, and especially police, protect the people’s interests and improve law and order.

This requires the creation of a lo-cal police service accountable to local authorities and local communities.

Moreover, a Map of Criminal Of-fences website will be created. all criminal offences in the country will be immediately reflected in this web resource.

The improvement of the peniten-tiary system is also one of the topical issues.

Towards a Red Tape-Free Economy

a great amount of work is related to the third direction – a complex of transformations ensuring industriali-sation and economic growth.

efforts towards the improvement of the tax and customs administration will be highly important.

First, this includes the integration of the tax and customs systems.

second, a step-by-step transition to a general declaration of incomes and property is now stipulated. starting in 2020, the general declaration will cover all individuals.

Third, in order to simplify the tax administration, the issue of introduc-ing a sales tax instead of a vaT will be worked out.

Fourth, it is planned to improve ex-isting tax regimes through the com-pulsory introduction of the tax audit of incomes and expenditures starting in 2017.

The OeCd countries’ experience shows that a major principle of an ef-fective economy is state support for small and medium-sized business, ensuring a suitable level of its protec-tion. These aspects are embodied in the entrepreneurial Code, containing modernised legal aspects of the re-habilitation and bankruptcy of busi-nesses.

The strengthened institution of the business ombudsman should become a central mechanism providing busi-ness protection and legal assistance to entrepreneurs.

In addition, it sets out the detailed legal framework of the state antimo-nopoly policy in line with OeCd standards.

starting Jan. 1, 2017, price regu-lation will be cancelled, instead of which instruments of antimonopoly regulation and control will be exclu-sively used.

new principles of cooperation and partnership between the state and en-trepreneurship will be enshrined in a revised version of the law on public procurement.

amendments to the Land Code have proven to be effective catalysers for the development of farming and the whole agricultural sector.

new legal regulations give an op-portunity for more than 224,000 ex-isting agricultural entities to privatise 97.4 million hectares of leased lands. It is also possible to pay only 50 per-cent of its cadastral value by instal-ments for up to 10 years.

Moreover, 85.3 million hectares out of 102 million hectares of reserve lands, dedicated to agricultural pro-duction, are also available for priva-tisation through auctions by individu-als and legal entities of Kazakhstan.

Property legalisation terms are ex-tended up to dec. 31, 2016. Privacy and protection from criminal and ad-ministrative prosecution are guaran-teed. This will increase the influx of capital and significantly decrease the level of the shadow economy.

a clear and straightforward proce-dure for the rehabilitation and bank-ruptcy of legal entities has been ap-proved at the legislative level.

a new mechanism for the pre-trial settlement of insolvency was developed to preserve sustainable productions and secure workplaces. Investors will obtain a possibility to minimise and prevent losses.

Legislative changes were adopted to encourage denationalisation and privatisation, allowing restrictions to be lifted on privatisation, assets to be sold at fair market value, as well as conditions to be created for the maxi-mum participation of Kazakh and foreign investors in privatisation.

Public offerings of shares on the stock exchange and through open auctions will be a key mechanism of privatisation.

In the first quarter of 2016, lists of objects, which are not subject to sales, will be reduced, and a draft law providing the abolition of pre-emptive rights of all shareholders on acquisition of sold assets of the quasi-public sector will be developed.

The implementation of the com-prehensive plan of privatisation for 2016-2020 has started taking into ac-count new mechanisms.

Sixty-five of the largest govern-ment companies, the samruk Kazyna sovereign Wealth Fund, the Baiterek and Kazagro companies, 173 sub-sidiaries and affiliates that are part of samruk Kazyna will be transferred to the competitive market within this instrument.

The current list of privatised ob-jects, consisting of 545 organisations will also be updated.

The procedure for granting subsoil use rights has been already simplified through the introduction of the auc-tions’ mechanism.

In the long term, Kazakhstan will switch to the australian model of subsurface use, which stipulates a fa-cilitated methodology of all types of geological works.

Today, the programme national Champions is becoming an essen-tial tool ensuring a new source of economic growth and increasing the

competitiveness of Kazakh busi-nesses.

Thirty-two companies – “national champions” – will ensure the growth of internal direct investments of ap-proximately $750 million by 2019-2020, the creation of about 15,000 workplaces and a 30-50 percent in-crease in labour productivity and the growth of non-resource exports by up to $260 million.

new Sources of Foreign Investments

Measures included in the economic bloc of the Plan of the nation stipu-late the engagement of at least 10 transnational corporations in the pro-cessing sector of our economy.

Three groups of national compa-nies of the manufacturing industry, infrastructure, energy and others will participate in the work on the creation of joint ventures with “anchor inves-tors.”

The first group is represented by enterprises subject to comprehensive modernisation through reinvestment.

The second group includes enter-prises that will attract the potential of transnational corporations.

The third group includes enterpris-es with a high level of market com-petition for “anchor investors” and promoting export brands.

negotiations have been held with more than 26 TnC’s, and concrete agreements have been reached with some.

The core issue of the third direc-tion of the Plan of the nation is the establishment of the astana Interna-tional Financial Centre (aIFC) with an independent court system, its own jurisdiction based on the principles of english law using the english language and the introduction of the principle of investment residency.

The Constitutional Law of Ka-zakhstan on the aIFC was adopted and came into effect.

The economic results of aIFC ac-tivities will be expressed by a boost in GdP growth, on average to the tune of 1 percent annually at the cost of foreign direct investments into the capital market of Kazakhstan.

More than 2,000 qualified work-ing places will be created within the aIFC.

Our capital astana will develop as a business, cultural and research cen-tre in eurasia, which will make good use of modern international transport and logistics systems, including a new airport terminal.

Horizons of Innovative Industrialisation

The Plan of the nation stipulates measures for the development of a number of potentially attractive sec-tors of the economy.

Primarily, it is subject to the indus-try of electric power and growth of energy efficiency.

It is important to achieve a 25 per-cent decrease in GdP energy inten-sity by 2020 and 50 percent by the middle of the century.

To that end, it is necessary to attract strategic investors to energy conser-vation through the mechanism of en-ergy performance contracts.

We will continue to work on the development of a science-based economy. Currently, 65 scientific projects are being conducted within the Technology Commercialisation programme implemented in conjunc-tion with the World Bank.

The attraction of “anchor transna-tional corporations” will give an op-portunity to establish centres of tech-nological development.

a number of key indicators will be achieved following the second five-year programme of industrial and in-novative development.

Innovative activities of the busi-ness sector will increase up to 20 percent of the GdP with the share of innovative productions up to 2.5 percent.

seven-thousand kilometres of roads of national importance will be reconstructed with a view to develop-ing transport and transit systems, as it was stipulated in the nurly Zhol state Programme.

By 2022, tolls for transit will generate almost 41 billion tenge (us$116.6 million), which will allow maintaining the whole network of roads of national significance.

To integrate Kazakhstan into inter-national transport and communica-tional flows, the project on creation of a multimodal eurasian transconti-nental corridor was launched.

It will ensure free transit of cargo from asia to europe and cut costs in half for the delivery of cargo.

The attraction of additional cargo flows through Kazakhstan will in-

crease transit traffic by all types of transport from the current 18 million tonnes to 33 million in 2020 and to 50 million in 2030.

deregulation of container transpor-tation will increase volumes by more than 500,000 tonnes in the next five years.

The transit potential of air transpor-tation in commercial aviation will be persistently increased, predominantly by national transporters.

an international air hub near al-maty will be created in order to raise the profitability of air transportation

To make astana an international financial centre before 2019, new international connections with lead-ing financial centres, such as Tokyo, singapore and Hong Kong will be launched.

a single regulatory instrument will be adopted in the construction sector that will regulate all licensing processes of a constructor based on a “one-stop shop.” new construction codes based on eurocodes have been brought into force since July 1, 2015.

Tourism, being a very promising sector, is expected to achieve con-siderable growth, mostly because of lowering of administrative barriers, developing new tourist attractions and routes and increasing the quality of services.

Incentives of Social mod-ernisation

rapid economic development de-mands special attention to the forma-tion of a new type of labour relations.

With this objective in view, the new Labour Code of the republic of Kazakhstan was adopted.

It is based on labour standards of the International Labour Organisa-tion and the OeCd.

an increase in human potential will be facilitated by reforms in edu-cation, healthcare and social protec-tion of the population.

education will be carried out in three languages – Kazakh, russian and english.

The core objective in healthcare is the introduction of obligatory health insurance.

It is also planned to improve the system of social assistance to the population in need through enforce-ment of its targeting.

The roadmap of employment has been updated with an increased level of financing.

The implementation of a new pro-ject called Free vocational and Tech-nical education for everyone will start in 2017.

Success of Reforms – Path Towards Unity of

nationa quarter century of Kazakhstan’s

independence has shown that only a united country can reach incredible peaks of development.

The essence of the fourth reform, aimed at strengthening the Kazakh-stan identity and unity of citizens, resides exactly in that.

We already have two baselines, which will gradually strengthen our nation of the Common Future.

First, it is the assembly of the Peo-ple of Kazakhstan. Multi-ethnicity is our common great treasure! The as-sembly of the People of Kazakhstan has been successfully implementing its mission as chief guardian of this treasure for 20 years now.

We have acquired our national idea – Mangilik el.

The word el carries a big unify-ing force because the motherland has been and will remain the most intimate and magnetic value for every Kazakh. We have to hand it down from generation to genera-tion through the ages. This is where a historic and spiritual power of the patriotic act Mangilik el should come through.

Our aim is to strengthen the com-mon identity and unity of our country via development of the Kazakhstan society on the principles of united cit-izenship and national values incorpo-rated in the Mangilik el on the basis of consolidation of our achievements since obtaining independence.

The OeCd system of tools is used to continue our work in these areas.

They are geared to the specific fea-tures of Kazakhstan, first of all in or-der to modernise culture, education, socialisation of youth and patriotic upbringing.

The experience of the OeCd countries shows that identity and unity could only rely on specific fac-tors: meritocracy, effective work of a professional government, ensur-ing the supremacy of the statute law, economic growth and transparent and

accountable work of the government. In other words, it relies on the suc-

cessful implementation of the 100 steps of the Plan of the nation.

open Government, accountable to SocietyAs part of the fifth reform to ensure

a transparent and accountable state, we need to address several key issues.

First, a state corporation Govern-ment for Citizens will be set up.

This new agency will incorporate the existing national state enterprises: Public service Centre, real estate Centre, research and Production Centre of Land Cadastre and state Centre for Pension Payments.

second, the whole system of pub-lic administration will be focused on achieving concrete results.

Third, to ensure quality planning it is necessary to guarantee the accu-racy of official statistics.

Fourth, on my instructions, au-dits and optimisation of programme documents of state bodies were car-ried out.

In the future, when planning, de-veloping and implementing pro-grammes at all levels we need to fol-low five key principles based on the OeCd recommendations – validity, continuity, transparency, monitoring and control.

Fifth, amendments and additions to the Budget Code were adopted. Pub-lic authorities were granted the right to ensure effective budget realloca-tion to achieve the final result.

sixth, the new system of evalua-tion of public authorities is based on the principles of mandatory exter-nal, independent audit, publicity and feedback from the public and person-al responsibility of executives.

seventh, one of the main criteria for the transparency and account-ability of the state is the increase of public access to information.

starting in 2016, access to all in-formation of public authorities and agencies will be provided at the re-quest of individuals and legal entities, with the exception of state secrets and other secrets protected by law.

State Functions – Towards competitive

Environment and Local Self-Government

state development requires the transmission of a number of govern-ment functions and currently there are nearly 4,500 of them in the com-petitive market.

To this end, a permanent commis-sion chaired by the deputy Prime Minister is being created, composed of Parliament members, the manage-ment of central executive bodies, rep-resentatives of atameken nCe and the Civil alliance of Kazakhstan.

It will identify a list of functions of all public authorities to be transferred to the competitive market.

reforms at the central level should be naturally followed by conferring additional powers to local authorities which will be transferred to them in three stages.

Plan of the nation – Project of Large-Scale

modernisation of Kazakhstan

The practical phase of the imple-mentation of the Plan of the nation has started. We have a long way to go and now we are taking our first 100 steps.

an evolutionary and comprehen-sive approach is the main principle of modernisation, which now drives our history of independence.

Only a strong state and a united nation can achieve successful mod-ernisation. We have stood many tests with honour and strengthened our spirits. We have created a new Ka-zakhstan – uly dala eli, the Country of the Changed Great steppe.

By implementing the Plan of the nation, we expand the horizons of our era of ascension of the nation.

The world certainly has examples of countries who stepped out from the Third World to the First. now, we are trying on the most successful global models of economic, state and social development.

Today, few countries in the world formulate their national dream in the same way: being on a par with the greatest nations of the world after coming out of centuries of oblivion.

We believe in this historical destiny for Kazakhstan.

The author is the President of the Republic of Kazakhstan. This is an abridged version of the opin-ion which is available in full on our website.

A8


eurAsIA&wOrld

Erlan Idrissov

Kazakh Fm Says multivector Foreign Policy Proves its Viability in Face of challenges


asTana – Kazakhstan’s mul-tivector foreign policy has prov-en its effectiveness against the backdrop of growing challenges internationally, Foreign Minister erlan Idrissov said during a dec. 23 press conference to discuss the foreign ministry’s 2015 work and plans for the next year.

He listed numerous landmark events and achievements during the year.

First, Idrissov noted the early pro-gress of the eurasian economic un-ion (eaeu), which came into effect Jan.1, and Kazakhstan’s economic interests in the organisation.

“This new association of the 21st century was created at the ini-tiative of President nursultan naz-arbayev first proposed in the early 1990s. The eaeu is based on the principles of equality, mutual ben-efit and the interests of all parties. First of all, Kazakhstan is looking for its own national interests,” he said.

He also said of the Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional religions, a Presidential initiative held in astana in June, that the “participation of high-ranked po-litical and religious leaders at the fifth congress is evidence of solid support of Kazakhstan’s initiative by the international community.”

The foreign minister also said Kazakhstan’s programmes to lib-eralise its visa regimes have prov-en successful.

In June, the government signed a resolution extending a pilot project on a visa-free regime up to 15 days for the citizens of some politically

and economically stable countries, such as the united Kingdom, Italy, south Korea, Malaysia, the neth-erlands, the united arab emirates (uae), the united states, France, Germany and Japan. The list was later expanded to 20 countries, in-cluding australia, Belgium, Hun-gary, spain, Monaco, norway, singapore, Finland, sweden and switzerland.

Idrissov also noted that the in-tensive negotiation process to sim-plify the visa regime with the eu-ropean union continues and that the establishment of the astana International Financial Centre is expected to lead to visa-free re-gimes for citizens of Organisation

for economic Co-operation and development (OeCd) countries, as well as Malaysia, Monaco, the uae and singapore beginning Jan. 1, 2017. He also noted that Kazakh-stan is modernising its visa process-es and has issued 242,645 visas in the first 11 months of 2015.

Idrissov also called Kazakh-stan’s aug. 27 signing of an agreement with the International atomic energy agency to host a Low enriched uranium (Leu) Bank in Oskemen, Kazakhstan an event of global scale and said the united nations General as-sembly’s adoption this year of the universal declaration for the achievement of a nuclear-Weap-

ons-Free World proposed by naz-arbayev on sept. 28 demonstrates support by the international com-munity for nazarbayev’s vision to achieve a nuclear-weapon-free world by 2045.

Idrissov also noted that in 2015, nazarbayev made 13 foreign vis-its and received 32 heads of state, governments and international or-ganisations. In total, the Kazakh Ministry of Foreign affairs (MFa) was involved in 38 major inter-national events, 70 bilateral visits and the foreign minister held 13 visits abroad.

“I would like to emphasise the productive visits of the President to Moscow, Beijing, London, Paris and many other capitals, which resulted in the signing of 275 eco-nomic agreements totalling about 170 trillion tenge ($60 billion). The implementation of agreements achieved at the highest level, espe-cially in the field of economic co-operation, remains a key priority of the MFa,” he said.

Idrissov underlined that Kazakh-stan supports the ideology called “from Great Game philosophy to Great Gain philosophy,” which foresees a “win-win” situation for all countries of the world.

Kazakhstan’s accession to the World Trade Organisation will also power further economic de-velopment through deeper inte-gration with the world community and more intense competition with global trade players, the minister said.

also, the visit of european un-ion High representative for For-eign affairs and security Policy Federica Mogherini and the dec. 21 signing of a new Kazakhstan-

eu agreement on enhanced part-nership and cooperation (ePCa) were mentioned among the most important achievements of the out-going year.

Idrissov also addressed the pri-orities of his ministry for 2016. attracting foreign investment, concluding foreign trade agree-ments and promoting the export of Kazakh products will be priorities in the coming year.

“a lot of work on ensuring wide and meaningful participa-tion of foreign countries in the upcoming international exhibition eXPO 2017 was held during the year. Thus, 61 countries and 13 international organisations already confirmed their participation. The work on attracting foreign partici-pants in eXPO 2017 will be con-tinued next year as well. Our task is to ensure participation of no less than 100 countries,” Idrissov in-formed.

Idrissov noted that in 2016, the Kazakh Foreign Ministry will continue to promote Kazakhstan’s candidacy for un security Coun-cil (unsC) non-permanent mem-bership in 2017-2018.

The implementation of the Foreign Policy Concept of Ka-zakhstan for 2014-2020 will also continue as well as efforts to fur-ther integrate the country into the world economy and transform the country’s infrastructure.

according to Idrissov, the most important function of the MFa is to protect the rights of citizens and legal entities of Kazakhstan as well as their personal, family and business interests abroad.

“We returned more than 500 Kazakh tourists from Turkey this

summer, who were stacked there in connection with the bank-ruptcy of travel agency, Travel system. The MFa together with the Ministry of Health and so-cial developmentorganised the transportation of number of our citizens from Germany, russia and ukraine on a special board for health reasons. Five citizens of our country from Bahrain and two from Libya rescued from the networks of criminal human traf-ficking syndicates have been re-turned to the homeland. In May, we deported the bodies of three family members of the Imanku-lov family, who died in a plane crash in France,” he said.

“I should note the financial as-sistance provided to 23 citizens of Kazakhstan, including the evacua-tion because of the worsening situ-ation in syria (1), yemen (1), the earthquake in nepal (7), returning home from Indonesia (2), Turkey (6), France (1), as well as the de-livery of five our citizens from afghanistan, China, russia and south Korea,” Idrissov added.

Idrissov mentioned MFa efforts to increase the openness of the state body to citizens and improve its worldwide recognition.

“We are working on the mod-ernisation of the official website of the ministry. annually, I hold an online Twitter conference. We pro-vide regular feedback to the popu-lation by the operational responses to the complaints of the citizens in a blog platform and the social net-works of the foreign ministry,” he said.

The minister also took questions from the press and wished citizens a good new year.

Fm Idrissov notes Key challenge of Ensuring Economic Development, Reaffirms Commitment to Win-Win Concept


asTana – Kazakh Foreign Minister erlan Idrissov recently said ensuring economic develop-ment in tough external circum-stances, especially in light of the effect on commodity exports, is one of the biggest challenges fac-ing the country.

His remarks were made dec. 23 during the Central Communi-cations service annual year-end press conference, when he was asked what other demands he would list for 2016.

“The tensions between rus-sia and the u.s. are also affect-ing Kazakhstan, since russia is our ally and partner. We also see various political challenges in ukraine, afghanistan, Iran and syria. The syrian crisis has an ef-fect on Kazakhstan, because the crisis is one of the main causes of terrorism which is a global threat,” said Idrissov.

Commenting on the role of Cen-

tral asia in the modern world and developing interaction among global powers in the region, Id-rissov said Kazakhstan and other countries are not “pawns” in a re-vived “Big Game.”

“I would like to underline that Kazakhstan fully rejects the con-cept of a ‘Big Game,’” he said. “Kazakhstan sees eurasia as a space for cooperation. We pro-pose a win-win concept which benefits everyone, where the in-terests of eurasia and Central Asia can profit and are not incon-flict with each other. This is the essence of the eurasian concept of the leader of our country. We will stay with this line, which is the foundation of our multi-vec-tor foreign policy.”

Idrissov added the Minsk agreements and their implemen-tation by all partiesare key for the resolution of the conflict in ukraine.

asked about planned visits abroad by the head of state in 2016, Idrissov said President nursultan

nazarbayev has been invited by united states President Barack Obama to visit Washington, d.C. at the end of March to participate

in the nuclear security summit. The following month, Kazakh rep-resentatives are expected to travel to Turkey for the Organisation of Islamic Cooperation summit.

“I think that in the situation of major fire and instability in the Middle east, the summit will have major significance where

serious conversation is to take place about the long-term devel-opment and security of the re-gion,” he said.

additional trips next year in-clude the shanghai Cooperation Organisation summit in Tashkent, uzbekistan and meetings within the framework of the eurasian economic union, Commonwealth of Independent states and Collec-tive security Treaty Organisation. In september, Kyrgyzstan will

host the summit of the Council of the Turkic speaking states.

In addition, China will host the G20 summit and Idrissov said nazarbayev had been invited to participate in a similar summit in st. Petersburg during russia’s chairmanship of the group.

regarding Kazakhstan’s plans to participate in united nations (un) peacekeeping operations, Idrissov noted the country already has military observers in Western sahara and Cote d’Ivoire.

“Kazakhstan’s peacekeepers are well trained, well equipped and ready to participate in the un peacekeeping operations,” he added.

The minister was also asked if he could recall any curious, light-hearted or confusing situa-tions during his long diplomatic career. He obliged by telling a story of Pope John Paul II’s visit to Kazakhstan in 2001. Follow-ing their performance at eurasian national university in front of him, a troupe of Kazakh danc-

ing girls ran to the Pontiff, who was going to bless them. Over-whelmed with emotion, they kissed him on the cheek.

“The Pope is the spiritual leader, of course, and it is customary to kiss him on his hand, so that situ-ation caused some laughter and smiles in the audience,” said Id-rissov. “The Pope did not lose his bearings and showed that he really liked that sign of affection.”

another account related to nazarbayev’s visit to Israel, when several hundred people carrying banners gathered in front of King david Hotel in Je-rusalem where the President was expected to stay. At first, Israeli security thought their presence was some sort of demonstration and planned to take preventive measures, only to discover they were Israeli citizens who had em-igrated from Kazakhstan. They were there to greet the President and thank him for all the great things he had done for them dur-ing their life in Kazakhstan.

apostolic nuncio Ends mission in Kazakhstan, Honoured by diplomatic corps

By dmitry Lee

asTana – The Kazakh Human-ities and Law Institute (KaZGuu) academic diplomatic Club and the embassies of the republic of south africa and the Kingdom of norway recently held an event in astana in honour of Miguel Maury Buendia, the apostolic nuncio of the Holy see of the vatican,who completes his diplomatic mission in Kazakhstan on dec. 30, the south african embassy reported.

at the initiative of the ambassa-dor of south africa shirish soni, the event facilitated dialogue be-tween the nuncio, representatives of foreign diplomatic missions in

the capital and KaZGuu students.some 40 foreign ambassadors,

diplomats and their spouses, as well as 80 students and academics from KaZGuuattended.

according to the press release of the south african embassy, Buendia gave the students “golden keys” to identifying their inner calling early in life, developing regular practices to build their capability and capacity, introduc-ing flexibility into planning their careers, holding singular focus on their primary callings and build-ing hobbies, developing personal traits and mostly being truthful at all times.

Buendia also urged students “not to waste their time during their

youth and to use their time wisely in building friends and studying.” He also shared his life experiences and history.

The KaZGuu students and diplomats asked questions, shared experiences, conveyed good wish-es to Buendia on his new posting and congratulated him on his 60th birthday,according to the press re-lease.

at the end of the event,director of the Institute of Postgraduate Programmes and International af-fairs of the KaZGuu university renata Faizova expressed her grat-itude to Buendia and awarded him a diploma of “Honourable Mem-ber of academic diplomatic Club, KaZGuu university.”

Buendia, 60, was appointed to Kazakhstan in may 2008. He will continue his mission in Romania, where has been since dec. 15, 2015.

IdRISSoV: “I would like to underline that Kazakhstan fully rejects the concept of a ‘Big Game.’ Kazakhstan sees Eurasia as a space for cooperation. We propose a win-win concept which benefits everyone, where the interests of Eurasia and Central Asia can profit and are not inconflict with each other.”

B2 B3

Nation&capitalWednesday, January 13, 2016

B7spOrTs

Poltoranin Wins World Cup Stage to Claim Top 5 Spot Overall

culTure

Skriptonite Dominates Russian-Speaking Rap Scene

peOple

Kazakh Cinderella Designer Opens Store in Paris, Launches International Brand

B

ASTANA OPERAJanuary 13 at 7 p.m. Traviata, Opera

January 16 at 17 p.m. La Bayadere, Ballet

January 20 at 7 p.m. Evening by a fireplace,

Concert

January 21 at 7p.m. Tosca, Opera

January 24 at 6 p.m. Karagoz, Ballet

January 25 at 7 p.m. Tatyana, Concert

NATIONAL MuSEuMNovember 18 - January 18 Historical exhibition

AuTOKENT CAMPINgJanuary 16 at 11 a.m. Winter Tulpar Race

ThINgs TO wATch & plAces TO gO

Rescue Teams Release Hundreds Trapped on

Snowy Highways

By meruert nurgazinova

rescue teams have saved more than 600 people trapped on Ka-zakh roadways because of heavy snowfall in early January, among them 454 people have been evac-uated, reported the emergency Committee of the Kazakh Ministry of Internal affairs.

According to the official state-ment of the committee, as of Jan. 4, traffic was closed on 21 sections of the highways in the aktobe, east-Kazakhstan, West-Kazakh-stan, Karaganda, Kyzylorda and Kostanai regions. among them, 13 roads are of national and eight of regional significance.

Furthermore, a number of bus

stations have stopped selling tick-ets for interstate bus lines.

about 265 checkpoints have been set up in the affected ar-eas. The akmola region has 132 checkpoints, aktobe and Kosta-nai regions 85 and 48 checkpoints respectively. a number of food points have also been organised.

The rescue operation involved 148 people and 67 rescue vehicles. It has been decided to bring 375 units of snow-removal equipment in order to clear the highways.

The Khromtau and Kargaly districts of the aktobe region have declared a state of emergency because of the cur-rent weather conditions. a mode of emergency at the regional level has also been declared in the Kokpekty district of the east Kazakhstan region.

Phot

o: in

form

.kz

Kazakh Pole acrobatics Break Stereotypes, Gaining Popularity


asTana – Pole dancing has long been associated with strip and night clubs, but now it is considered to be a new form of performance art as well as sport, combining elements of dance and acrobatics. representatives of the pole acrobatics federation shared their thoughts and hopes with The astana Times.

yelena Matvienko, who is cur-rently on maternity leave, has headed the federation for three years. The organisation has been working solely in the capital, but hopes to expand to other Kazakh cities.

“The idea of the federation is very simple. It is to develop pole dancing in our city, also to give people an opportunity to under-stand that pole dancing is a very serious, challenging and simulta-neously fascinating sport. a sport! also, one important reason for the creation of the federation was the obtaining of sport status and the right to organise official champi-onships,” she said.

Matvienko noted the number of men and women interested in the sport is increasing.

“This direction in Kazakhstan requires intensive development. We are still far away from the level even of russia, but a lot of Kazakh pole dancers put in great efforts to achieve a high level, both athletes and coaches,” she said.

Originally performed with a wooden rod, pole acrobatics has its roots in ancient China, where a variety of complex tricks were completed to enter-tain the emperor. now, amateur and professional championships are being organised throughout the world.

To become a qualified pole acro-batics trainer, the individual must attend various master classes, complete the certification and ex-ercise constantly.

“The process of learning for the coach never stops. every day they come up with new tricks which re-quire not only the strength of arms and legs, but also flexibility and stretching.

Coaches work not only on the pole. There are regular exercises on the surface, as well as using machines,” she said.

as a new sport, pole dancing also faces challenges such as per-ception.

continued on Page B8 Sofya matvienko

Kazakh art Studio Releases comics about Zombie apocalypse


asTana – astana Triumph, a comic book about the zombie apocalypse, is the newest crea-tion of Orazkhan Zhakup. The almaty resident is the co-founder and editor of Khan Comics, the nation’s first comics art studio.

Commissioned by an american whose daughters love the zombie theme, the book tells the story of two teenage sisters who went to summer camp near the capital. an explosion at a secret lab re-leased an unknown virus which turned people into zombies and the girls must break through the crowd of monsters to reach the city and their parents.

astana Triumph was made for a private collection and released in limited edition. although it is not for sale, comics aficionados will soon be able to enjoy simi-

lar stories. Khan Comics plans to release the first part of Orda (Horde) for mass circulation this spring, according to Tengrinews.

The new series tells the story of a future post-nuclear war world, where technology has leaped for-ward but states have disappeared. Orda begins in Zhana shymkent (new shymkent) in the 2300s, while other storylines are based in the steppes, where people suf-fer from radiation and struggle for resources. The action occurs amid the creation of a new horde, the leader of which considers himself to be the reincarnation of Genghis Khan.

Comics can be considered a new wave in Kazakh culture compared to Japan, european countries or the united states.

“yes, now our people read comics. Mainly it is young peo-

ple 14-25 years old. People’s attitudes are becoming normal when compared to the period 10 years ago. I think it’s mainly be-cause of Hollywood; even people from the financial world see that you can earn well on comics,” said Zhakup in an interview with graphic-novels.ru

Comics lovers in Kazakhstan as well as russia already know Khan Comics. Zhakup and his partner adilya smagulova, the studio’s art director, launched their project in 2010, according to idea-lab.kz. at the same time they organised the first comics exhibition, where young artists brought their work to show the audience in the hope of becom-ing part of Khan Comics. The first comic book compilation was released the following year, followed by several additional

digests to build a recognisable name and find paths to Russian shops.

The studio works with different authors, mainly selling comics in russia due to the small size of the Kazakh market. Khan Com-ics also completes private orders.

“despite the fact that comics have been loved for a long time in the world, Kazakhstan is only now beginning to take an inter-est in this fascinating genre. To-day, in the CIs (Commonwealth of Independent states) only a few publishers and art studios regularly publish comics of their own production. I am sure that due to the unique combination of heritage and modern feeding, they will certainly find their au-dience,” said smagulova during the presentation of the Fairytales comics, according to Today.kz.

astana Triumph comics, Khan comics.

Police Forces to be Controlled by Akimats

Staff Report

a new law giving local agen-cies and local communities more control over local police activities came into effect Jan. 1.

President nursultan nazarbayev approved the law in november 2015 to make police activities more transparent. In astana alone, more than 1,500 local police offic-ers are going to be recruited as part of the local police force, which will then be controlled by the may-ors’ offices, reported the press ser-vice of the astana department of Internal affairs.

according to the press state-ment, the purpose is to ensure transparency of police activities by giving control over it to the lo-cal administrative bodies and local communities.

“The newly created local po-lice forces will be responsible for the prevention of minor violations, criminal offenses, as well as for road safety. at the same time, the introduction of any other duties to

the newly created service is strictly prohibited,” explained chief of ad-ministrative Police of astana Police Colonel Bakhytzhan Malybayev.

Local police services will have separate departments, such as dis-trict police inspectors and their assistants, juvenile police, school inspectors, divisions for the pro-tection of women against violence, divisions for environmental and road patrols, as well as detention centres for administrative detain-ees and reception centres for per-sons with no fixed address.

It was stated that the heads of the local police departments should report on the performance of the police service to local akims (may-ors) and maslikhats (local assem-blies) at least twice a year and pub-lish a public report at least once per year. according to police repre-sentatives, such measures will help make sure the police departments answer the needs of the popula-tion, which will also improve the overall level of confidence among the population in the police.


peopleB2

NatioN&Capital

Kazakh cinderella designer opens Store in Paris, Launches International Brand

By dmitry Lee

asTana – People yearn to hear success stories in the per aspera ad astra (to the stars through difficul-ties) genre, especially in light of consumerism and the constant de-mand for cash. It’s harder each day to find exceptions, especially for citizens of the post-soviet coun-tries.

The broken soviet ideology has spawned millions of immigrants from the former communist bloc.Once they were at liberty to travel, they flocked to Europe and the americas in pursuit of dreams with a primitive knowledge of the english language and western life-style.

The cruel reality of capital-ism has shattered the premature hopes of many, but some, the most persistent ones, have had their breakthrough moments.

Madina akhayeva was born in a tiny village in southern Kazakh-stan, but in spite of all the chal-lenges her destiny had in store for her, she managed to open a shop in Paris and launch her own brand, Madeva.

“I painted from early childhood and when I saw the first catwalks of Fashion Week on television, I was impressed and this is how I picked my profession,” she said during an interview with Kapital, the local Kazakh newspaper.

It has been difficult, however, for a resident of a small town in the Zhambyl region to make her vision of a profession as a successful de-signer come true.

“There was no way to [start a ca-reer] in our village; there was no room for my works,” she said. “at the time, my father worked at an agricultural company and hosted a French partner who he befriended

and often invited to our home. For me, it was a chance to practice my english.”

The Frenchman noticed and ap-preciated her clothing designs.

“He said I was talented and had to go to Paris – the capital of fash-ion – where I could find use for my talent,” she said.

At first, Akhayeva admitted she didn’t believe him, though she eventually took his words serious-ly and decided to travel to Paris. The man, who was also involved in charitable activities, paid for her studies as he clearly saw her po-tential and was convinced of her success.

“I didn’t speak any French and I didn’t have any money, but the Frenchman was an exceptional man with big life experience. He travelled a lot and helped people in different parts of the planet,” she said.

after graduation, akhayeva studied other designers and decid-ed to launch her own brand.

“In my first collection, I want-ed to demonstrate Central asian inspiration with the clothing in-terpreted in the european style – jackets, blouses, skirts and coats. Today, I create [clothing] in the classical style, but every time there is something new. I would call it

‘interpretation of the classics,’” she said.

after living in France for 15 years, akhayeva admitted she is torn about her sense of identity.

“It’s a tough feeling. I love both countries and I would call myself a cosmopolitan. There are moments when I just want to quit everything and leave for Kazakhstan to create something there. But I can’t leave

everything. I love Paris so much! This is the city of my whole life,” she said.

akhayeva has an online store which she wants to continue pro-moting worldwide. some american and Japanese stores have ordered from her in the past, which certainly can’t be overlooked in her portfolio.

“success is an ability to get up after tripping. at some point, one needs to stop thinking and start acting. We often hear great suc-cess stories, as if success can be achieved in an hour. no, it re-quires a lot of work. dream, but don’t forget to work hard and suc-cess will prevail. There is no other way,” she said.

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Skriptonite dominates Russian-Speaking Rap Scene


asTana – adil Zhalelov, also known as skriptonite, has quickly won the hearts of listen-ers with his fresh sound, great beat and true, sometimes explicit lyrics. The young and promising rapper has definitely brought a new wave to Kazakh music cul-ture. His debut album, released in november, is number two on russian iTunes behind adele and her album, 25.

“In my songs, I am talking about the life of the ordinary citizens of the former soviet union with com-mon household problems. so, I try to express things in my texts with simple words; then my thoughts are available for many. What is the point of writing music if peo-ple do not understand it? I do not understand rappers who rap about their rap. I think they are defective people. Where is the rest of their lives? Where are the people in it?” said Zhalelov in an interview with sobaka.ru.

Zhalelov was born in 1990 in Leninski village near Pavlodar city. He became involved with music as a youngster and got inter-ested in rapping at 11.

He and his friends created JILLZ in 2009. Four years later, skripton-ite and rapper niman released the music video vBvvCTnd, which gained a large number of views in a short period of time. It also gar-nered interest from Gazgolder, the russian production centre created by vasily vakulenko, (aka Basta and noggano), the rapper known throughout the Commonwealth of Independent states. In Febru-ary 2014, skriptonite became of-ficially connected with Gazgolder

and began working on his debut album.

“House with a normal Phe-nomenon” was released to good reviews. songs and videos by the young rapper and collaborations with other artists now get mil-lions of views and likes. some fans even call him “nuclear Ka-zakh,” referring to his quick rise to fame.

“Within more than an hour, Zhalelov offers not just concept, atmospheric work, but also a fair variety of genres – from trap and new york hip hop to almost gos-pel,” said yaroslav Zabaluyev, a reviewer at Gazeta.ru who called the album among the best new ones that month.

several of skriptonite’s songs were named among the 50 best of the year, according to the-flow.ru.

He is the first Kazakh artist to sign a contract with the label and first Kazakh rapper to have such suc-cess.

The rapper is a hit with rolling stone.

“The most promising rookie of Gazgolder records and russian rap in general, Skriptonite first be-gan creating beats when he was a teen. Inspired by southern hip hop of the united states, the native of Kazakhstan does not want to experi-ment with texts with ‘deep mean-ing,’ which is typical for russian rap overall, when characters often want to look smarter than they really are. Instead, adil focuses on the musical component in which he is personally involved,” according to an article in the magazine.

skriptonite was also named rap-per of the year by Colta.ru.

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Book about chokan Valikhanov Presented in moscow


asTana – “Chokan valikh-anov,” a book by Zharylkap Bey-senbaiuly about the Kazakh schol-ar, ethnographer and historian, was presented dec. 14 at the rus-sian Geographical society (rGs) headquarters in Moscow, reported FK news.

The volume, supplemented by new historical and archival docu-ments, contains important findings concerning unknown facts from valikhanov’s life and era, accord-ing to the agency.

society deputy executive di-rector Ilya Gurov noted the organi-sation is actively cooperating with its Kazakh colleagues and jointly implementing a number of pro-jects.

“The unique life path of va-likhanov is an example of civic exploits, fascinating adventures and military intelligence skills,” he said, as reported by the agency. “He carried a high title of rGs member with dignity and he would have managed to do a lot; it is a pity that fate allotted him too few years of life.”

The book was published in rus-sian with support from the Kazakh Ministry of Culture and sports and the Kazakh embassy in rus-sia. The publication is timed with the 180th birthday of the Kazakh scholar and the 170th anniversary of the society, according to FK news.

embassy Minister Counsellor viktor Temirbayev expressed his appreciation to translators, who enabled the book written in the Kazakh language to be available for russian readers.

“It is gratifying that today’s event was held within the walls of the russian Geographical society, of which valikhanov was a mem-ber,” he said. “Our great compa-triot made a notable contribution to world culture, history, geogra-phy and many facets of his talent require comprehension.”

Temirbayev emphasised that valikhanov unites russia and Kazakhstan and in that sense is a

symbol of friendship between the nations, the agency reported.

“In the year of the 550th anni-versary of the Kazakh Khanate, valikhanov’s character is revealed in a new way,” said raushan Kanapyanova, a professor at Mos-cow state art and Cultural univer-sity and the russian Presidential academy of national economy and Public administration. “His research and reflections on Asia’s nations are very relevant for un-derstanding today’s changing world system.”

she expressed the hope that support for valikhanov’s legacy, which left his historical and cul-tural mark on Kazakhs, will be systematic and consistent.

doctor of Historical sciences and leading researcher at the rus-sian academy of sciences Insti-tute of Oriental studies alexander Kadyrbayev considers valikhanov

one of the best representatives of 19th century russian science.

using the advantages of the famous book written about va-likhanov by Irina strelkova, a new, more imposing work which became Beysenbaiuly’s volume was needed to comprehend such a personality. Kadyrbayev ex-pressed confidence that this his-torical and biographic narrative will find its reader, reported FK news.

Beysenbaiuly has been study-ing the life and works of the great Kazakh ethnographer for many years, travelling the route of his “diary of a Trip to Issyk Kul” es-say written in 1856 and visiting places where he lived and worked. Beysenbaiuly is also the author of books such as “In the Footsteps of Chokan” (1977), “The Fate of Chokan” (1987) and “Chokan” (2009), according to the agency.

astana opera Stages Sold out Shows in Italy

By Zhania Urankayeva

Tickets quickly sold out for the astana Opera’s recent performanc-es of “La Boheme” at the Carlo Fe-lice ancient Italian theatre, reported the press service of the astana-based opera house.

The performances were the first time “La Boheme” was stage with Kazakh artists in the lead roles. Kazakh soloists were said to have performed exceptionally well.

The Genoese public is familiar with Kazakh artists who presented a well-received performance of masterpieces of Kazakh classical music on nov. 29.

astana Opera Concertmaster dolores umbetaliyeva spent two

weeks with the troupe working over the staging in Italy.

“The play involved a large number of professionals – all of them devoted their strength to the performance. The most impres-sive was the discipline this great team showed. The theatre’s pia-nists impressed with their flaw-less play and Italian musicians paid a lot of attention to the ac-companists. I was surprised how different the quality and style of piano playing of Kazakh and Italian musicians can be. I tend to think that the reason for this is different piano schools,” ex-plained umbetaliyeva.

“La Boheme” was staged dec. 27 and 29, as well as on Jan. 2 and 3. The televised version was aired

by ettore scola on dec. 29 and repeated on Jan. 3 on the Genoa Theatre Tv channel www.stream-ingcarlofelice.com. Fans of classic art were able to watch interviews with soloists, who shared their experience working in Genoa and told more about their characters in the play.

aigul niyazova played the role of Mimi, Medet Chotabayev pre-sented rudolph, saltanat akhme-tova presented Musette, while Talgat Mussabayev played Mar-seille and the roles of schaunard and Collen were given to eugene Chainikov and arthur Kaipkulov. Only on Jan. 2, Italian soprano serena Gambertoni and Leonardo Kaimi performed the two main characters.


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The ministry stressed that the mission of the armed forces of Kazakhstan continues despite the celebrations. In order to provide safe and peaceful holidays, the military are guarding both on the ground and in the air.

Kazakhstan to Host Two army Games competitions in 2016

By dmitry Lee

asTana – a delegation of Ka-zakhstan’s Ministry of defence re-cently took part in a conference in Moscow, along with 47 other state delegations, to discuss the 2016 In-ternational army Games, the press service of the Kazakh Ministry of defence reported dec. 21.

Two competitions, Masters of artillery and sniper’s Landmark, will take place on the polygons of Kazakhstan, where the best snip-ers and artillery units will be de-termined.

The event will also include 23 contests in aerial and naval train-

ings. The games will be held on the territory of 21 military polygons, two of them in Kazakhstan. so far, 16 countries have confirmed their participation.

This year, Kazakhstan par-ticipated in the first International army Games called army 2015. The Kazakh armed Forces took part in three events, including sailors and marines in the Cas-pian sea, military pilots in a con-test called avia darts and tankers in a tank biathlon. The country’s servicemen won second place in the avia dartsand the Caspian sea contests and finished fourth in the tank biathlon.

Research: aral Sea’s age doesn’t Exceed 24,000 years


asTana – research conduct-ed by an international academic group has estimated the age of the aral sea does not exceed 24,000 years, reported the nauka v sibiri edition of the russian academy of sciences’ siberian branch.

The group included sobolev Geology and Mineralogy Insti-tute senior research officer Ser-gei Krivonogov, who has studied the sea for 13 years, according to russian news agency Beyond the Headlines. For the first time, sci-entists drilled through the sedi-ment from the surface layer to the underlying deposits. samples of carbon-bearing material such as mollusc shells and small shellfish were studied using an accelerated

mass spectrometer, which gave precise information about the wa-terway’s transformations. using radiocarbon dating, they deter-mined the approximate age and concluded the aral sea originated some 20,000-24,000 years ago.

The study showed the re-

gion was home to ancient civi-lisations, proven by man-made changes to the natural landscape such as the use of fresh water for irrigation purposes. The aral sea has also had shallow times dur-ing the last 2,000 years similar to the current one, including two lengthy regression periods when the water level fell significantly and the sea bottom was visible and two shorter transgression periods followed by the modern period of man-made regression. rather than being full of water, as it was some 50 years ago, the aral has at times been in a state not unlike the current one.

In the 1960s, the sea was an im-pressive body of water covering about 70,000 square kilometres. It was the fourth largest inland sea

after the Caspian sea before los-ing three-quarters of its volume and 60 percent of its water surface due to soviet irrigation techniques and massive cotton production in Turkmenistan and uzbekistan.

In October, Khabar Tv channel reported the aral sea could regain its status as the country’s harbour as a result of the successful imple-mentation of the regional project on managing the syr darya’s riv-erbed and preserving the northern part of the waterway. The project, implemented in partnership with the World Bank, allowed the crea-tion of the Small Aral, the first man-made sea in the country.

Many experts believed the aral sea was irretrievably lost. The dry-ing was so severe it caused nega-tive environmental consequences, damaging flora and fauna in the region. Shipping and fishing were no longer possible and the sea had moved 100 kilometres from its for-mer coastline. The distance from aralsk is now only 17 kilometres and some fish species and fish in-dustries have returned.

The aral Sea.

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nearly 2,000 People Take Part in Santa claus Parade in almaty


asTana – a large parade of people dressed as ded Moroz or ayaz ata in Kazakh (character sim-ilar to Father Christmas or santa Claus) was held in almaty on dec. 27. nearly 2,000 participants in costumes walked the central streets of the city and congratulated resi-dents and visitors on the upcoming new year, reported Kazinform.

“Generally, this tradition is more than one hundred years old. The first such parade was held in 1905. For almaty, it is the third one. By the way, participants did not have to have their own costumes. Or-ganisers registered everyone who

wanted [one] and gave them cos-tumes. But many santas came in their own New Year outfits,” said Project Organiser yegor sviridov, according to nur.kz.

anyone could participate in the parade; this year people aged from 2 to 50 shared the experience. The distance was almost four kilome-tres, so some santa Clauses even rode bikes.

“The parade was wonderful, all the participants were satisfied. This year’s parade was the biggest among the ones in recent years. This is the third parade in almaty. Last year the number of partici-pants was about 1,000. One woman even came from the region to take

part in our parade,” said sviridov, according to Zakon.kz.

The event finished with a flash mob, a contest for the best costume and a presents giveaway to the par-ticipants.

Kazakhstan’s big cities, such as shymkent and Karaganda, also de-cided to support the tradition and organised parades on their streets.

The santa Claus parades came from Western countries, where they are traditionally held to cel-ebrate the official opening of the Christmas season. Here they were adapted to the new year. Today, one of the biggest parades is the fa-mous Toronto santa Claus Parade, which was the first back in 1905. Ph

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Kazakh Air Force Celebrates New Year by Keeping Country Safe

Staff Report

Kazakh air Force Pilots con-tinued this year their tradition of celebrating new year’s eve up in the sky while guarding the country, reported kazpravda.kz.

While the whole world gets ready to welcome the start of a new year, Kazakh pilots continue to carry on their important mission and stay on guard to protect the country’s borders, said a Kazakh Ministry of defence statement.

This year for the first time, mili-tary pilots showed what it is like to celebrate and wish all Kazakh citizens a happy new year while onboard a warplane.

The ministry stressed that the mis-sion of the armed forces of Kazakh-stan continues despite the celebrations. In order to provide safe and peaceful holidays, the military are guarding both on the ground and in the air.

The unit commanders also tradi-tionally congratulate the troops as it is important to create a festive

atmosphere to make the holiday as comfortable as possible.

Kazakhtelecom to achieve 100 Percent communication digitisation by End of 2015


asTana – Kazakhtelecom plans to achieve 100 percent com-munication digitisation by the close of 2015 and support all state initiatives, significantly increasing the number of communications us-ers and quality of services, report-ed the company’s press service.

“as of today, we have achieved a 99.7-percent level of communi-cation digitisation. By the end of the year we are going to achieve a 100-percent level of communi-cation digitisation of all telecom-munication networks. Our digital Kazakhstan programme will cover all major scopes of activities of Kazakhstan citizens, including public services, production, tour-ism, agriculture, trade, municipal services, safety and so on,” said Kazakhtelecom strategic Manage-ment department Chief Technical

Officer Batyr Makhanbetazhiyev at a dec. 21 joint session of the company and nur Otan’s econom-ic Policy Council, according to the press service.

Makhanbetazhiyev noted digi-tal Kazakhstan can be imagined as a building and its infrastructure as the base, with the programme focused on the new and united in-frastructure. He added the Internet consumption model is changing, as more and more Kazakh citizens use mobile Internet.

“In 2014, we had 851,000 us-ers of mobile communication. It is estimated that in 2015 the number increased more than twice,” he said.

Kazakhtelecom Chairman Kuanyshbek esekeyev presented projects targeted at achieving the high priority goals specified in the state-of-the-nation address of the President and discussed the

technological readiness of the company to support all state ini-tiatives. He indicated its immedi-ate breakthroughs were possible due to the Orleu development programme.

Both parties highlighted the im-portance of cooperation between the communications provider and the state and the impact of such co-operation on Kazakhstan’s living standards and competitive ability. Legislative initiatives such as mo-bile number portability, construc-tion of fiber-optic communication lines in villages and other state actions in the telecommunication field were also discussed.

Kazakhtelecom is the major communications provider in the nation and owns up-to-date infra-structure and facilities. The com-pany implements strategic state projects such as adapting cash registers for small and medium

business which send data to tax committees online, various elec-

tronic commerce projects, devel-oping a cloud-based environment

and services and supporting data centres.

Joint session of Kazakhtelecom and nur otan’s Economic Policy council on dec. 21.

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Turkic-Style city to be constructed in Kazakhstan


asTana – Plans are underway to construct “new Kyzylorda,” a Turkic-style city on the left bank of the syrdarya river, reported Tengrinews with reference to the Kyzylorda akimat (regional ad-ministration) press service. The design was presented to local and foreign investors attending the Bai-konur Invest Forum held dec. 14-15 in Kyzylorda.

The author of the project and Kazakhstan’s union of urban Planners President Lyubov nysan-bayeva noted the distinctiveness of the project is that the entire urban architecture will be done in unique Turkic style, according to the agen-cy.

“experts estimate that even un-der current rates of the city’s popu-lation growth, the number of resi-

dents will grow from 260,000 to 350,000 people by the year 2050. When developing the project, we first of all proceeded to the needs of future residents in a comfort-able, convenient, well-thought-out way for the life of an urban envi-ronment. at the same time, it was important not lose touch of the new city with the historical centre of Kyzylorda, as well as with the centuries-old history of the silk road,” said nysanbayeva.

The concept of the new city has incorporated the most con-temporary approaches of Western and eastern urban planning prac-tice and architectural elements of Beirut, Bukhara, Tashkent, Tunis and yemen while representing a unique, modern city created in classic Middle eastern style, said Tengrinews.

nearly 1,500 hectares were thor-

oughly planned for future com-fortable life, work, tourism and learning. according to the design by local authorities, the first phase will be completed by 2025, with construction funding at the ex-pense of investors.

“With regard to Kyzylorda, I mean to say that along the left bank, 270,000 people live here in 2015. By the year 2025, 375,000 people will be living in the city. That is not a fad, it is a necessity… Investors will come. They said they will build commercial housing with their money if we guarantee infrastructure,” Kyzylorda region akim (Governor) Krymbek Kush-erbayev told journalists at a dec. 25 briefing in Astana. “We said that local authorities will be helping to implement economy class housing; we can take such a responsibility on ourselves. I have no doubts.”

Short documentary Portrays Lives of Kazakhs Working as Truck drivers in US

By dmitry Lee

asTana – a 23-minute docu-mentary portraying difficulties Kazakh immigrants face work-ing as truck drivers in the u.s. was released on nov. 17, 2015 by director Kanat Beisekeyev on his personal youtube channel and immediately drew the attention of Kazakh social media users. some have experienced the same, while others were curious what the im-migrant life can be like in the u.s. Still others criticised the film’s characters for leaving their home-land.

The plot revolves around seven-year immigrant nurlan Kozhakhmetov who Beisekeyev met in a new york bar in august 2015, where the idea to shoot the short documentary was conceived.

Beisekeyev then embarked on a two-week trip with Kozhakhmetov to film his documentary, where he would meet other Kazakh immi-grants – truck drivers.

While recounting the main chal-lenges of immigrant lives, one of the main characters in the film, nurbek Khassen, said driving a truck in the u.s. offers opportuni-ties to see many u.s. cities, meet a variety of people and learn dif-ferent accents and street slang. He

said Kazakh immigrants can make a living working as truck drivers without higher education and earn the same money as “an average american and sometimes even more.”

The documentary, while focused on the profession, was also meant to describe the lives “of Kazakh immigrants in general who are in pursuit of happiness on the roads of america. In spite of them being so far away from their homes, they still hear the dearest music in their souls,” Beisekeyev wrote on his youtube Chanel. However, dur-ing almost the entire short film, the viewers are shown the difficulties

of being a truck driver in the u.s. On top of that, every truck driver in the film admits that this is a tem-porary job and they’re dreaming of changing their profession in the future.

“all of these guys still have their small and big goals,” Beisekeyev said in one of his letters to local media. “all of them are tied to their homeland and are homesick.” according to Beisekeyev, “all of them, without exception, send a quarter of their salaries to their relatives in Kazakhstan, saying ‘no’ to their own comfort,” – some even live in their trucks to save on rent.

Screenshot from the film – main character Nurlan Kozhakhmetov.

no-drilling dental cavities Treatment to be available in astana, almaty


asTana – Innodent, the tech-nology for treating early-stage dental cavities without drilling, will be available in dental clin-ics such as versailles, dent Lux, ambassador, Zhayik dent, anga, smile and Mediker in the capital and almaty beginning in February, said company founder Bauyrzhan aituov in a recent interview with The astana Times.

“The versailles clinic intro-duced Innodent therapy in no-vember last year and received good results. With one drop of Innodent product, cracks and white spots on patients’ teeth dis-appeared and their own healthy enamel was formed one month after the procedure,” he said. “as you know, white spots are the first stage of tooth decay; if left untreated, it goes over to mid-stage in the course of time.”

Versailles clients were the first in the nation to receive the treatment, and doctors and patients were sat-

isfied with the results, noted Ait-uov. The product is designed to

treat decay at the initial stage when tooth enamel is destroyed but its

intact structure is retained and can regenerate.

“The essence of the treatment lies in a non-invasive implantation of the protein matrix, which then completes building the enamel from a patient’s saliva during one-month’s time. It is an implantation in a literal sense, but the process goes without operating or anaes-thesia and is absolutely safe,” said aituov.

The essence of the technology lies in changing the approach to the therapy of dental cavities, he added.

“We usually postpone our visit to a dentist until the ‘better’ time as we have been afraid of the drill’s sound and pain since child-hood, but now it is possible to cure tooth decay without these un-pleasant emotions,” said aituov. “This is particularly important for children. If they visit a dentist every three months and conduct Innodent therapy if needed, then they will never know what drilling and filling is.”

He noted Innodent is not an in-novative filling, but natural and healthy enamel.

“No filling or implant is com-parable with a natural tooth,” said aituov.

Mid-stage tooth decay is accom-panied by destruction of the den-tine and formation of a cavity. In that case, a filling cannot currently be avoided.

“There might be other methods of non-invasive cavities treatment in the future, but it is still early to talk about,” he added.

using the company’s formula, Innodent is being produced by Bachem, a swiss chemical and biotechnology company.

“Peptides are not being pro-duced on an industrial scale within the Commonwealth of Independ-ent states and those that are pro-duced do not have good manufac-turing practice (GMP) certificates. Therefore, the swiss quality of our product comes first for us,” said aituov.

The company does everything else in the capital, including man-ufacture of nano-hydroxyapatite which is also part of the compa-ny’s line, as well as packaging the finished product.

Innodent is registered in Cus-toms union countries Kazakh-stan, russia and Belarus. no product is permitted in the mar-ket without registration, espe-cially for use within a clinic, said aituov.

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air medical Service Has Busy yearStaff Report

The past year was a busy 12 months for Kazakhstan’s air Medical Service team, which flew more than 2,000 flights during the past year.

More than 6,000 times, the ser-vice has executed emergency mis-sions during the five years of its existence. The central office re-ceives calls from every region of the country.

“First of all, we assist preg-nant women and then [assist with] new born babies, chil-dren of all ages and patients with cardiovascular diseases. Five mobile teams are work-ing around the clock. Most of-ten we have surgeons, gynae-cologists and cardiologists on board. Our pilot warned that because of the current weather conditions, [flights] won’t be easy, however, for doctors it is a usual thing. To provide as-

sistance the aircraft and heli-copters usually have to land in the mountains or in the steppe, which is sometimes combined with high risks for all on board. … Most recently we have been to Thailand, south Korea, Chi-na and Mongolia,” said deputy Head of the national Centre of sanitary aircraft Gumyrbek agibayev.

according to the head of the cen-

tre nurlan akylbekov, in 2015 the service flew to Cologne, Germany for the first time to transport Kazakh citizens, who had been hospitalised in a critical condition abroad.

Other emergency services also had a busy new year’s week. In astana, 80 ambulances were on duty new year’s eve and the po-lice doubled their presence on the city streets in light of massive pub-lic celebrations.


The meeting was attended by deputy Chairman of the sen-ate askar Beisenbayev, Chair-man of the senate Committee on Foreign relations, defense and security Ikram adyrbekov, officials from the Ministry of Foreign affairs, the Ministry of Culture and sports, the Inter-

national Center of Cultures and religions and other agencies and departments.

“The importance of the planned conference is evident given the tumultuous time we live in,” said the senate speaker during the plan-ning meeting.

The fifth Congress of the Lead-ers of World and Traditional re-ligions was held in astana in June

2015, resulting in a resolution calling for stronger dialogue and understanding among religions and condemning any violence in the name of any religions. un secretary Ban Ki-moon, Presi-dent of Finland sauli niinisto and King abdullah II of Jordan attended the event along with dozens of religious leaders from around the world.

astana to Host ‘Religions against Terrorism’ conference in may


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once again, an Idea for Former Semipalatinsk Test Site to Become Tourist attraction


asTana – Kurchatov, a for-merly secret town in the east Kazakhstan region that was the administrative centre for the ad-joining semipalatinsk nuclear Test site, is seeking new ways to earn money and revive the city. a new concept to organise tour-ist tours has been developed by city authorities and Kazakh na-tional nuclear Centre, located in Kurchatov, reported Timeskz on Jan. 1.

despite its high science poten-

tial, Kurchatov cannot feed itself because it lacks a developed agri-cultural sector. existing personal farmsteads do not help much. sup-plies mostly come from neighbour-ing regions, semey and agricul-tural fairs.

at the same time, Kurchatov is located near a huge area of the for-mer nuclear test site, which is not suitable for agricultural use.

so city authorities and the man-agement of Kazakh national nu-clear Centre have established a plan to organise paid tours of the former semipalatinsk Test site.

“The concept includes three

routes, a range of services for their organisation, rules for en-tering the facilities, descriptions of the types of transport to reach Kurchatov for domestic tourists and the possibilities for tourists from other countries, by airplanes or trains,” said akim (Mayor) of Kurchatov nurbol nurgaliyev, according to Timeskz.

He also noted that the number of foreign tourists who wish to see the place where the soviet un-ion conducted long-term tests of nuclear weapons with their own eyes is growing constantly. If eve-rything goes according to plan, at

least 5,000 tourists every year will be able to visit the city, authorities estimate.

during the soviet times, more than 450 nuclear tests were con-ducted at the test site, leading to radiation-induced illnesses among the locals and leaving significant areas of land contaminated for mil-lennia. yet, according to various studies, certain portions of the for-mer test site, which used to spread over 18,500 square kilometres, do not contain radioactive traces.

It is reported that steps have already been taken to implement the concept. according to nur-galiyev, the plan was personally presented to the head of the Fed-eral agency for Tourism of the russian Ministry of Culture Oleg safonov to attract experienced partners in the field of tourism and promote tours.

“russian agency fully supports our project on the organisation of tourism at nuclear Test site ob-jects. In the next step, the issue will be discussed at the intergov-ernmental level. These plans are very relevant for us. Kurchatov has transport links to astana and during eXPO 2017 it will be possible to invite a lot of for-eign tourists to the objects of the semipalatinsk Test site. among other positive things, there will an additional income for the local entrepreneurs and budget,” added nurgaliyev.

TOurIsm&eXpO 2017B6

Regions of Kazakhstan Join Construction of

EXPO 2017, As Medical Staff Learn English


asTana – The government administrations and a number of district manufacturers from the Kostanai, Pavlodar and Karagan-da regions signed memorandums of cooperation with the astana eXPO 2017 national company on dec. 28 to participate in the national effort to host the inter-national exposition eXPO 2017 from June 10 to sept. 10, 2017 in astana. The agreements mean almost all regions in Kazakhstan will be involved in the construc-tion of eXPO 2017.

“Today, we signed memoran-dums on cooperation with the re-gions. Thus, we implemented the instruction of President nursultan nazarbayev to attract domestic enterprises in the construction of eXPO. as a result, new jobs will be created in every region of the country. In total, in the framework of memorandums, 232 contracts were signed. The deliverables were established for more than 32 bil-lion tenge (us$89.6 million). also, domestic businesses will perform works and render services worth more than 15 billion tenge (us$42 million),” Chairman of the astana eXPO 2017 company akhmetzhan yessimov said.

medical Staff of EXPo 2017 to Learn English as part of the preparations for

EXPO 2017, Astana’s Office for Language development has or-ganised english courses for health-care workers, where 260 people have now been enrolled. The pro-gramme started in april 2015.

Last year, the astana akimat (city administration) jointly with the asta-na eXPO 2017 national company developed a plan to provide medical care for guests and participants of the upcoming exhibition.

The administration of the com-pany determined that seven posts of primary medical care and one medi-cal ambulance station will be based on the territory of the exhibition complex: four first aid stations with an area of 20 square metres, three first aid stations with an area of 30 square metres and one ambulance sta-tion with an area of 78 square metres. One doctor and a nurse will provide medical care at each first aid station.

also, during eXPO 2017, prima-ry health care organisations of the city will organise around-the-clock posts of healthcare workers at the locations where the guests stay. In emergencies, patients will be taken to city hospitals. each hospital will be provided with 30-50 additional beds during the three-month event.

astana EXPo 2017 announces Winners of Journalism competition


asTana – The country’s na-tional company astana eXPO 2017 announced the winners of its first competition among local jour-nalists on dec. 24.

The competition, which began in June, was held among national, re-gional and online media. The idea

of the competition was to cover in the best possible way the upcoming international specialised exhibition eXPO 2017.

about 100 pieces of journalism from across the country were sub-mitted for the competition.

Five jury members judged the works and on dec. 24 Jury Chair-

person Farida Baktybayeva and jury member nurtore Zhu sip an-nounced the winners.

The winners include journal-ists from the Kostanai, Kyzylorda, Pavlodar and north Kazakhstan regions. The winners among the national media include the Tv and radio Complex of the President,

24.kz, Khabar, Kazinform, Bnews, Kursiv and ana Tili.

Chairman of astana eXPO 2017 akhmetzhan yessimov congratu-lated 17 winners of the competition and awarded them travel tickets to Turkey, where they will visit eXPO 2016 to be held in antalya from april 23 to Oct. 30.

starting with the philosophy of “Cultivating a Green Life for Future Generations,” eXPO 2016 antalya has adopted the theme of “Flowers and Children” along with the motto “a Green Life for Future Generations.” History, bio-diversity, sustainability and green cities make up the four sub-themes of eXPO 2016 antalya.

eXPO 2016 antalya, which will host national and international congresses, panels, meetings and seminars, will also provide cultural and artistic activities for its guests. It is anticipated that eight million local and foreign visitors will visit eXPO 2016 antalya during its six-month duration.


The visitors to the geoglyphs likely spend about $240,000,000 per year to visit Peru and the geo-glyphs. The tourism is based upon trekking to see the sites, and sever-al large towers. The most common tourism vehicle is a small plane ride over some of the geoglyphs at a price of $100-$600. This type of operation could be set up easily, and cheaply as no brick and mortar hotels are needed on site. They can come later. The moneys are used to maintain the tourism, to study the geoglyphs, and to preserve them. Most of the tourists are from the u.s. and Latin america

Currently there are few tourists visiting the geoglyphs in Kazakh-

stan, but there is no reason that a geoglyph tourist industry such as in

Peru could not be established as the Geoglyphs are unique, captivating

and mysterious. This would in-clude optimal tourism and ecotour-ism to help study and preserve the artefacts.

The core messages are:Geoglyphs are exceedingly rare

in the world;Kazakhstan has the opportunity

to establish a thriving geoglyph tourism industry as Peru;

There is an enormous fascination about these ancient artefacts;

Tourism could help study and preserve the geoglyphs;

Potentially over $240,000,000 could be generated by geoglyph tourists to Kazakhstan.

The author is emeritus director WHO Collaborating Centre and Professor emeritus in epidemiolo-gy, at the university of Pittsburgh.

Geoglyphs, the Future of Kazakhstan Tourism?


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Tennis Popularity Grows in KazakhstanBy Zhazira dyussembekova

asTana – almost all regional centres in Kazakhstan currently have their own tennis complexes built to international standards. In the first half of December, Aktau and Kostanai launched recently-built centres; now, only Petropav-lovsk is among the large metropoli-tan areas waiting for a new sports facility. according to Kazakhstan Tennis Federation executive di-rector dias doskarayev, tennis is quickly gaining in popularity, re-ported inform.kz.

“The second phase of construc-tion of the tennis centres is planned for the future, especially in major

cities. Today, there is a shortage due to the fact that the amount of people engaged in tennis is grow-ing rapidly. For example, almaty city already has a shortage of both indoor and outdoor courts. With the infrastructure available now, we will certainly develop. In some regions, there are waiting lists for parents to sign their children for tennis, but there are no places,” he said.

summing up the results of 2015, doskarayev noted the federation accomplished all the activities planned for the year. He added the strategy of attracting foreign ex-perts will continue in 2016.

“We are in the process of an ex-

perience exchange. … We give it high marks. We have managed to increase the number of certified professional coaches from 87 to 200 over the past four years. It was not easy, because the greater the number of courts, the more people are engaged in tennis, not only as amateurs, but also on a profession-al level,” he said.

another focus in 2016 will be on the development of youth tennis.

“We understand that children’s tennis is the foundation of our fu-ture. Our leading tennis players of the Fed Cup, of the national team, of the davis Cup should have a re-serve team, the second team, third team. a great job is being done, so

in the future we will have the op-portunity to select the best tennis players for teams that will play af-ter our leading tennis players finish their careers,” he said.

Tennis was introduced in Ka-zakhstan in 1933, when it was included in the dynamo society contest programme in almaty. Two years later, the first tennis school was opened and first official com-petitions held in the city. By 1937, almaty had 12 courts.

Today, Kazakh players show good results in many international competitions, including the davis Cup, Fed Cup and Hopman Cup, as well as aTP, WTa and ITF tourna-ments.

Poltoranin Wins World cup Stage to claim Top 5 Spot overall

By dmitry Lee

asTana – Kazakhstan’s alexey Poltoranin took three podiums out of eight races,

which had starts this year and won a World Cup stage during the International ski Federa-tion (Fédération Internationale de ski or FIs) World Cup series

held Jan. 1 – 10 in switzerland, Germany and Italy.

Poltoranin beat three-time Olym-pic Champion swiss dario Co-logne to win the race only by +0.1

in a very tight finish during stage five in Oberstdorf, Germany on Jan. 6.

“I had a great race,” Poltoranin said after the race as quoted by FIs. “I am happy, I am the first guy this winter to beat Martin [Johnsrud sundby] in a distance race. I hope for top 10 in Toblach and I will fight for the third place in the Tour de ski.”

norwegian Martin Johnsrud sundby, who, in spite of having a terrible stage five, retained his first position overall.

“I had a terrible day. I lost many seconds. I have to look forward to the next day and try to have a bet-ter day on the next stage,” he told the media.

sundby went on to earn one sec-ond place and two wins going fur-ther into the World Cup stages and stays on top overall ahead of Finn Haagen rogh, his fellow country-man, and russian sergey ustiugov.

Poltoranin is in the fifth place overall, the next stage will take place in Planica, slovenia on Jan. 17.

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Almaty to Build Skateboard Parks,

BMX Tracks


asTana – almaty city plans to build skateparks, BMX trails and bicycle tracks in 2016, almaty akim (Mayor) Bauyrzhan Baibek announced during a dec. 29 online conference on the egov.kz plat-form, Kapital.kz reported Jan. 2.

The BMX tracks and skateparks will be built near the First Presi-dential Park in the children’s park near almaty 1 railway station on sholokhov street and in the Cen-tral Park of Culture and Leisure next to an old cycling track, ac-cording to the news website.

“In addition, building a bicycle track close to sunkar International ski Jump Complex is being ad-dressed. Building another five fa-cilities is planned until 2020. also, the construction of downhill tracks is planned in the area of Kok Tobe Mount,” Baibek said.

The city’s first skatepark opened in almaty’s central park at the end of last summer. The 600-square-metre park is geared toward nov-ice and advanced skaters and was

built with the input of professional Kazakh skateboarders, Tengrinews reported aug. 28.

almaty has approximately 500 skaters between 10 and 30 years old and the number is rising, ac-cording to the agency.

“There is no year-round skate park in almaty and that creates inconvenience and deprives be-ginning sportsmen an opportunity to skate and practice their skills,” representative of the rafting Ini-tiative Group, which is organising the parks effort, ekaterina Grib-anovskaya said, Tengrinews re-ported. “We built this area in some two weeks, there was criticism from professional skaters which we have adopted and fixed.”

The new skatepark project is being conducted with the involve-ment of professional skateboard-ers, domestic manufacturers of skateboards, owners of sporting goods stores, public figures, as well as with support from the cen-tral park management and depart-ment of natural resources and environmental Management of almaty, almaty.tv reported.

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another crew from Mobilex racing entered the top 10 of over-all standings in cars category – yuri sazonov and alexey Kuzmich, rac-ing a Hummer. They took seventh place and their total time was be-hind shagirov’s and yevtyekhov’s by more than four hours. debutant yerden shagirov and experienced co-driver arslan sakhimov, also from Mobilex, took 20th place.

Marat abykayev and andrey

Chipenko of the Off road Ka-zakhstan team were the only repre-sentatives of Kazakhstan in the T2 category, which is all terrain pro-duction vehicles. They won second place in the category.

This year, yevgeniya nesterova debuted at the africa eco race 2016 and became the first female motorbike rider from Kazakh-stan to participate in such a major event. during the 11th stage, her GPs-tracker stopped working and she had to leave the race. However,

during the last stage, the Kazakh athlete from Mobilex racing rid-ing a Husqvarna continued the race and eventually took 18th place. She became the second female fin-isher behind russian anastasiya nifontova.

africa eco race is an annual rally that crosses Morocco, Mau-ritania and senegal. In addition to the racing, the event tries to bring attention to security issues, sustain-able development and eco-respon-sibility.

Kazakh Team Wins Category at Africa

Eco Race 2016

Alexey Poltoranin crossing the finish line

Win Streak Puts Barys within Shot at Playoffs, Team Ranks Seventh in Eastern conference

By Ilyas omarov

asTana – The last week of 2015 and the first one of 2016 saw the Barys astana hockey club win-ning five out of its six encounters in the regular season of the Conti-nental Hockey League (KHL).

First, the Kazakh team crushed Metallurg novokuznetsk in an away game, 6-2. This was followed by an equally resounding defeat of 1-5 in novosibirsk at the hands of local sibir.

returning to astana, the hosts managed an impressive four straight wins, first against Sev-erstal Cherepovets (4-3 in over-time), the league’s current lead-ers, the legendary CsKa Moscow (4-3) on new year’s eve, and then against ugra Khanty-Man-siysk (3-2 in penalty shootouts) and avtomobilist yekaterinburg (4-3). The last win was arguably the most important one since the visiting team is astana’s key ri-val for eighth place in the eastern

Conference, which guarantees a spot in the playoffs.

This week, Barys plays away, and on Monday they started with a confident win against Lada Togli-atti 4-1.

all these victories helped Barys astana break into the playoff zone, where they are now placed seventh in the eastern Conference.

The season’s 50th game (out of 60) for the astana team will be played today in yaroslavl against Lokomotiv.


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The academy offers training in martial arts, such as grappling, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, boxing, mixed martial arts (mma), Thai boxing, judo, karate, cross Fit and yoga and, as the main feature of the 850-square-metre facility, it offers a professional octagon ring for hosting MMA fights.

astana Energy companies Reduce Polluting Emissions

Staff Report

The Astana mayor’s office re-cently reported a 22 percent reduc-tion of emissions’ volume from energy enterprises, leading to a “favourable” pollution rating.

according to a city press re-lease, 24,700 tonnes of emis-sions were released in 2014 with 27,200 released in 2015. Levels of nitrogen oxides also decreased by 19 percent (1,700 tonnes per year) and the amount of sulphur dioxide was reduced by 21 per-cent (3,900 tonnes per year).

The city will continue pol-lution reduction efforts with a 2015-2016 plan to improve astana’s air quality, includ-ing astana energy environ-mental activities and control measures over motor vehicles’ emissions.

Improved reclamation of ash at disposal area no. 1 and the launching of ash disposal area no. 2 at Heat electropower station – 2 reduced dust emis-sions by 35 percent. Further-more, 440 gasoline and diesel vehicles have been checked at the astana – Karaganda and

astana – Kokshetau route. among them, 36 cars exceeded the allowed level of exhaust, which have been included in the protocols of the adminis-trative police service.

at the beginning of the year, the average pollution index was about 4.2 units, which is estimated as “low” by the Ka-zhydromet gradation. The main sources of air pollution remain motor transport, energy sector enterprises as well as the private housing sector which continue to heat their homes with coal or diesel.

astana city administration (akimat).

Largest martial arts academy in central asia opens in astanaBy dmitry Lee

asTana – Qazaq Batyry, Cen-tral asia’s largest martial arts acad-emy, which includes 10 training groups, recently opened in astana, vesti.kz reported dec. 19.

“Our [academy] offers a vari-ety of the most popular martial arts,” said Chairman of the su-pervisory Board of the Mixed Martial arts (MMa) Federation

of Kazakhstan aidar Makhme-tov. “We have established an all-purpose academy – that’s what makes us special. There is no need to look for an ‘octagon’ or a boxing ring, no need to feel torn apart. We have punching bags, Cross Fit gear all under one roof.

In due time, the academy will be-come the centre of trainings for professional fighters in order to take part in big competitions of na-tional and international scope. We

want to bring up Kazakh champi-ons, batyrs so they would repre-sent our country with dignity. at the same time, we will also set up favourable terms to train youth.”

The academy offers training in martial arts, such as grappling, Brazilian Jiu-Jitsu, boxing, mixed

martial arts (MMa), Thai boxing, judo, karate, Cross Fit and yoga and, as the main feature of the 850-square-metre facility, it of-fers a professional octagon ring for hosting MMA fights.

“We ordered the mats for our octagon and the ring from eu-

rope,” said President of the acad-emy Kanat alin. “as for the con-struction itself – we ordered it in astana. To lift the interest in our trainings, we are planning to host master classes with world-class fighters.”

The academy plans to introduce

yearly and monthly fees start-ing between 20,000-25,000 tenge (us$59-$72) for adults, depend-ing on the range of services and 18,000 tenge (us$52) for children. The academy’s capacity is 900 pu-pils per month, operating hours from 7 a.m. until 11 p.m.

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“recently, people’s attitudes started to change. a lot of them already know what pole dance is, but like in many other countries there are certain stereotypes, es-pecially considering the mental-ity of our country. I knew girls who practiced secretly from their parents, explaining that their pas-sion would be misunderstood,” said Matvienko. “Many people still believe that during train-ing our athletes dance and strip. They are very surprised when we demonstrate the most complex elements on the pole, show our bruises and calluses. Frankly, even in my circle of friends, not every man can catch up on the bar.”

she characterised the associa-tion with sexual dance as “not ac-ceptable.”

“We are athletes. We do not have anything in common with clubs

of that direction. Our goal is the stunt, the complicated element.

strip dancers have quite a different aim,” she added.

after people see a performance, stereotypes vanish and they begin to have deep respect for the sport.

“In order to clarify what we are doing to ordinary people, I say it is close to a street workout, it is very close to pole acrobatics. The only difference is equipment,” she added.

age, nationality and gender are of no consequence.

“sport is great! everyone choos-es a direction by himself. The main thing is about moving and achiev-ing good results. do not be afraid to break your stereotypes,” said Matvienko.

Federation deputy head Kristina Ganatauskaite is a certified trainer with two years of experience.

“When I was 27, I came for indi-vidual training on pole acrobatics for the first time. I fell in love with

this sport and still am. Pole acro-batics for me is more than a hobby and not a job. It is my soul, my in-spiration. I give my heart and all my skills during training. I really love my students and I think they love me, too,” she said.

Pole dancing can take an exotic, striptease or sports bent.

“exotic dance is beautiful and graceful, but can seem vulgar. I think striptease does not need ex-planation. sport pole dancing is my direction. Here, everything is very strict like in a big sport. young children and adults, wom-en and men come to us. We do a lot of emphasis on physical ac-tivity since many people come to us to lose weight; a lot of atten-tion is paid to stretching and, of course, the elements on the pole. I would explain it as something between gymnastics, acrobatics and street workout,” she said.

similar stereotypes were once associated with the society, but they have quickly faded.

“The older generation associ-ates this sport with striptease. We even select faster music to not be associated with it. But after people see our performance, they completely change their opinions. Mothers of my students thank me that their daughters have so much confidence and strength. The fact that we do not have any vulgarity is proven by the fact that in the autumn we performed at a char-ity concert in asia Park shop-ping mall. We and Istina dance Academy used to organise flash mobs in the park and the concert which was recently held at the Palace of Pioneers. and there were many children and elderly people. sometimes we get even a standing ovation, which is so amazing,” she added.

Kristina Ganatauskaite

Kazakh Pole acrobatics Break Stereotypes

-16 c 1 (91) kazakhstan supports, participates president … · 2020-03-24 · 0° / -16°c...

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