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Protests in Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan closes five of seven checkpoints on border with Kyrgyzstan - Kyrgyz authorities

According to the border service, transit passage of citizens of Kyrgyzstan and third countries through the territory of Kazakhstan "to the countries of destination is temporarily prohibited"

BISHKEK, January 7. /TASS/. The Kazakh authorities closed three more checkpoints on the border with Kyrgyzstan, the Border Service of the State Committee for National Security of Kyrgyzstan reported on Friday.

"Since January 7, 2022, the Kazakh side has unilaterally temporarily suspended the passage of persons, vehicles and goods at the checkpoints Kordai-Avtodorozhny, Karasu-Avtodorozhny and Kegen-Avtodorozhny, due to a malfunction of the Unified Information System," according to the statement.

On Friday morning, the Kazakh authorities closed two more checkpoints on the border with Kyrgyzstan for the same reason. Currently, only two of the seven checkpoints on the border of the two states operate.

According to the border service, transit passage of citizens of Kyrgyzstan and third countries through the territory of Kazakhstan "to the countries of destination is temporarily prohibited."

"The accumulation of persons and vehicles at the checkpoints on the border with Kazakhstan has not been recorded. The situation on the Kyrgyz-Kazakh section of the state border is characterized as stable," the statement says.

Protests erupted in several Kazakh cities on January 2, later growing into mass riots and attacks on government offices. Thousands of casualties have been reported, including fatalities. Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev asked the Collective Security Treaty Organization, a military alliance of former Soviet republics, for help. First peacekeeping units have already started fulfilling their tasks in Kazakhstan. The government said order has generally been restored in all of the country’s regions by the morning of January 7, while the situation is the most difficult in Almaty.

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