MOSCOW, January 5. /TASS/. The Kazakh leadership will most likely be able to settle the situation in the country and the rise of anti-Russian forces to power in the republic is hardly possible, Head of the State Duma Committee on CIS Affairs, Eurasian Integration and Relations with Compatriots Leonid Kalashnikov told TASS on Wednesday.
"I do not even deem it possible and the situation in the world has changed. We understand well what Kazakhstan means for us: this is the longest border for us. And I don’t think that this will happen," the senior lawmaker said, replying to a question about the threat of anti-Russian forces coming to power in Kazakhstan.
"I hope that they will cope with that, considering what [President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart] Tokayev is doing there now. I think that they will cope with that," he said.
Fuel price hikes triggered the protests in Kazakhstan and "some forces interested in destabilizing the situation in the republic swiftly and immediately took advantage of that situation," the senior MP pointed out.
"This can be evidenced by how quickly, as compared to 2011 and 2008 when such economic protests already took place in Kazakhstan, these developments spread from the [country’s] west to quite other regions that had never participated in such events," he pointed out.
The senior Russian lawmaker pointed to how quickly "pro-Western Internet-channels" interfered in the protests and "began to bring people to the streets and coordinate them."
"We must understand clearly: this is an internal affair of Kazakhstan, of course, but it is undoubtedly important for us," he pointed out.
According to official data as of October 1, 2021, 19,063,000 people lived in Kazakhstan. As the first results of the population census held on September 1 - October 30, 2021 suggest, the share of Kazakhs in the republic’s ethnic structure reached 70.18%. According to the data of the previous 2009 census, Kazakhstan was home to slightly over 16 million people, with Kazakhs accounting for 63.1% and Russians for 23.7%.
Protests have been raging in Kazakhstan for the fourth day in a row. On January 2, crowds took to the streets in the cities of Zhanaozen and Aktau in the Mangistau region in the country’s southwest, protesting against fuel price hikes. Two days later, riots erupted in Almaty (in the country’s southeast) where police used stun grenades to disperse crowds and also in other cities, in particular, in Atyrau and Aktobe (in the west), Uralsk (in the northwest), Taraz, Shymkent and Kyzylorda (in the south), Karaganda (in the northeast) and even in the capital of Nur-Sultan.
Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev earlier declared a state of emergency in the Mangistau and Almaty regions and also in Almaty and Nur-Sultan for two weeks. On January 5, the head of the Kazakh state dismissed the government. Its members continue discharging their duties until a new Cabinet is approved.