NUR-SULTAN, January 10. /TASS/. Terrorists, including foreign militants, directly participated in the Kazakhstan insurrection, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said at an extraordinary online session of the leaders of the CSTO (Collective Security Treaty Organization) member states on Monday.
"I can definitely affirm the direct participation of terrorists, including foreign gunmen, in the aggression against Kazakhstan. It is no accident that the bandits launched attacks on morgues at night to whisk away their dead accomplices. They also recovered the gunmen’s bodies directly from the battlefield," the Kazakh president specified.
International terrorists of "well-known origin" use this practice, Tokayev pointed out. "This is precisely how they cover up their tracks," he said.
The plot of creating a zone of chaos on the republic’s soil with the subsequent seizure of power is clearly obvious, Tokayev stressed.
Protests erupted in several Kazakh cities on January 2, escalating into mass riots with government buildings getting ransacked in several cities a few days later. They were accompanied by attacks on the police, military and governance bodies in many cities of the country and primarily in Almaty.
The ensuing violence left scores of people injured, with fatalities also being reported. Subsequently, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev turned to the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) requesting assistance from the Russia-led bloc. As a result, peacekeepers have already been deployed to Kazakhstan. Law and order, Kazakh authorities affirm, was restored to all of the country’s regions by the morning of January 7.