News

While speaking about corruption in tax and customs agencies Tokayev noted that the difference between Chinese and Kazakhstan’s statistics reached $5.7 billion in 2021. The main reason for that is contraband.

«About 90% of those who are engaged in foreign trade have to deal with corruption. More than 45% of entrepreneurs were forced to pass money under the table to customs officials. The Anti-Corruption Agency has already revealed three corrupted customs posts in the West Kazakhstan region. But we have 49 customs posts all over the country. It means that bribery in the customs and transport spheres...

President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev highlighted that he is disappointed with such organizations.

«…We have to prevent them from taking part in the state procurement. Often their proposals are too attractive thanks to low prices but in reality, it’s nothing more than a trick. We have to be careful, to think about every offer,» he said.

This is why big international companies so rarely participate in bidding by the state agencies in Kazakhstan, said the president. He’s ordered the government to reconsider how the procurement system works in the public and quasi-public sectors in the country.

According to Tokaev...

It is assumed that the teaching and learning process in the NKU will be based on the UA standards while fully complying with the national legislation of Kazakhstan. The studying process is going to start in September 2022 and will be based on a dual-degree program and joint research with English as the prime language of teaching and learning. The ministry requires that at least 30% of the NKU teachers must be foreign professors and business representatives. They will teach local students several majors including education, IT, engineering and agricultural technology.

In turn, Kazakhstan’s ministry of education is going to...

According to the authors of the suggestions, there are about 1.5 million people in Kazakhstan who have low incomes. However, only 998,000 of them are recipients of the targeted social support. The deputies believe that the reason this has happened is an incorrect estimation of poor people in the country.

Even though Kazakhstan’s GDP has gradually grown for years, the income poverty line has remained the same. Along with individual income tax removal for low-income citizens, the Nur Otan deputies have offered to raise the income poverty line to make it meet the current GDP. They also want to combine...

According to the Mazhilis press service, Koshanov’s candidacy was nominated by Erlan Sairov, a deputy of the chamber.

«Erlan Koshanov has been elected as the new chairman of Mazhilis through secret ballot procedure. To ensure that the voting complies with official procedures, the chamber created a vote count panel. Voting booths and glassy ballot boxes were brought to the Mazhilis. The new speaker of the Mazhilis Erlan Koshanov expressed his gratitude to all deputies for their trust,» the official statement said.

The Central Electoral Commission (CEC) of Kazakhstan has confirmed that Nurlan Nigmatulin, who had served as...

Until this new nomination, Erbolat Dosaev was head of the National Bank of Kazakhstan, having worked there since 2019.

On January 13, a petition to President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev appeared at the otinish.kz website. Residents of Almaty asked the president to discharge Bakytzhan Sagintayev from the office of Almaty mayor. As of January 17, about 25,000 people signed that petition. In the document, people blamed the former mayor for avoiding the public space during the unrest; he didn’t appear in the public until January 8 and did nothing to support people and prop up their morale during those days in early...

According to the KazMunaiGaz company’s press service, KazMunaiGaz, Ozenmunaigaz and KMG Engineering have been conducting the detailed exploration program of Uzen since 2017.

Over 2017-2021 the partners implemented a high-definition 3D seismic survey of the site. They reexamined more than 7,500 oil wells here, reassessed a geological concept of the site and updated the 3D model of its geology.

As a result, the explored oil stockpile of Uzen is now bigger by 8% or 39.9 million tons if compared to those earlier figures. At the end of 2021, this additional volume of oil was officially included in the list of...

The company is going to operate flights between Frankfurt and Almaty twice a week on Mondays and Thursdays and on Almaty-Nur-Sultan-Frankfurt route on Tuesdays and   Fridays.

As Lufthansa noted, all these flights will meet sanitary and epidemiologic requirements and will be conducted in accordance with the schedule the company has already published on its website.

Lufthansa has temporarily stopped air travel to Kazakhstan due to the riot in Almaty and some other cities of the country in early January this year.

Over the past decade, the ramp-up of the output of the domestic cement industry was about 5.5% on average. However, in 2020-2021 the industry reported intensification of the output growth by 10.4% and 15.4% respectively.

According to the market participants, the main reasons for the production ramp-up are a buzz in the construction and stable demand for high-quality cement from Kazakhstan in neighboring markets.

«The key driver of the increase in output is a surge in construction in Kazakhstan. Cement consumption spiked by 25% in 2021 all over the country. Another driver of the growth is stable demand for Kazakhstan’s...

The top seed of Kazakhstan ranked No.12 in the global tennis rating, Elena Rybakina has decided to leave the Australia Open tennis tournament after suffering an injury.

During singles Grand Slam tournament, Rybakina met with Chinese player Zhang Shuai, 74th position of the WTA ranking.

The tennis players met twice before, when Rybakina of Kazakhstan scored two wins. However, this time in Australia Elena wasn’t so fortunate and lost out to Shuai with a 4:6 score.

At the very beginning of the second set, Rybakina lost a serve and then suddenly decided to stop the game citing the injury. Even...

Kazakhstan border guard officials have detained an Uzbek citizen on the Zhibek Zholy crossing point on the Kazak-Uzbek border due to suspicion of his involvement in the massive unrest in Kazakhstan, the Committee of National Security (KNB) press service reported. 

While searching the detainee, born in 1993, the police found a mobile phone with video taped during the unrest in Shymkent.

«There is a bullet wound, presumably from a rubber bullet, on the back of the detainee,» the KNB press service said.

Right after the arrest, the suspect was transported to local police in the Saryagash district.

As...

Samit Abish, nephew of the first president of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev, has been discharged from office, according to Akorda, the official office of the president.

President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has signed an official edict even though KNB announced on last Friday that Samit Abish is still the first deputy of KNB and is on a vacation.

«According to the president’s decision, Samit Abish has been discharged from the office of the first deputy of the Committee for National Security (KNB) of the Republic of Kazakhstan,» the agency said in an official statement. 
 

The number of foreign shareholders in Uzbek companies rose by 8.2% over the past year, according to the Central Depository of the country.

Individual investors have become a core driver of the surge. Over the last 12 months, 225 foreign nationals and 12 entities have invested in Uzbek public companies. 

Currently, foreign investors own shares of local companies worth a total of $357.5 million. American companies and individuals have bought shares in 44 Uzbek companies. They were very active last year on the market and have even pushed Luxemburg out of the top ten countries in terms of volume of...

Prime Minister Alikhan Smailov of Kazakhstan has revoked a draft law on ratification of the agreement between Kazakhstan and the United Arab Emirates on strategic partnership. 

Under the agreement, Kazakhstan was going to sell 74.99% of shares of Ust-Kamenogorsk and Shulba hydropower stations. The new rule has already been published even though no official comments from the cabinet have been given. Therefore, it’s not clear whether the deal is just postponed or has been rejected completely. 

According to information published on privatization.gosreestr.kz, the agreement on the sale of the two hydropower stations was scheduled for March 15, 2022.

As the...

The former head of Kazakhstan’s Committee of the National Security (KNB) Karim Masimov has been accused of a violent attempt of coup d’état, according to the KNB’s press service.

The KNB has been conducting a pre-trial investigation into state treason – the main accusation against the former head of the agency Karim Masimov. Moreover, as some media reported, Masimov is also accused of abuse of official authority and actions aimed at a violent seizure of power in the country.

Similar charges have also been brought against two deputies of ex-chairman of the KNB – Anuar Sadykulov, head of the Secret...

President and CEO of TAV Airports Sani Şener has told Bloomberg HT how unrest in Kazakhstan can impact investments and business of TAV Airports in the country.  

Şener said that cargo flights have been restored after the police and military have taken control of the Almaty International Airport. Many shops inside the airport have been looted but the crucial infrastructure is unharmed.

«Almaty is one of the key airports in our portfolio. It accounts for 20% of our total turnover. Unlike other airports, about 75% revenue of the Almaty airports comes from cargo flights, ground services and aviation...

The new cabinet has been approved in Kazakhstan, the president’s press service reported.

President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has appointed the following members of the cabinet: 

•        Roman Sklyar – first deputy prime minister;
•        EralyTugzhanov – deputy prime minister;
•        Mukhtar Tleuberdi – deputy prime minister – minister of foreign affairs;
•        Bakhyt Sultanov – deputy prime minister – minister of trade and integration;
•        Galymzhan Koyshybayev – head of the prime minister’s office;
•        Muran Bektanov – minister of defense;
...

The Ministry for Development of Informational Technologies and Communications has a meeting in the Uzbek IT Park to discuss the future development of the IT industry. 

As Minister Sherzod Shermatov noted over the period from 2022 to 2026, Uzbekistan is going to implement a series of investment projects in the area of information and communication technologies and is ready to allocate $1.5 billion.

The agency wants the number of available services on the Single Portal for Interactive Public Services to reach 610 by the end of 2026. 

It is expected that the government will expand the number of fiber-optic communication...

In 2021, oil production in the country is going to reach 85.7 million tons in total; 67.6 million tons of oil were exported abroad during the year; 17.1 million tons were reprocessed and 13.1 million tons of oil products were produced, according to Magzum Mirzagaliyev, head of the Ministry of Energy.

As the minister reported the volume of production at Tengiz is going to reach 26.5 million tons of oil and 14.5 billion cubic meters of gas.

«There is a $45.2 billion Tengiz oil field expansion project underway. Once the project is done, the oil production will rise by...

The international provider of the satellite communications OneWeb has confirmed its successful deployment of 36 satellites by Arianespace from the Baikonur Cosmodrome.

This is the 12th by the company overall and 9th since December 2020. As a result, OneWeb now has in-orbit constellation of 394 satellites. This represents over 60% of the company’s planned 648 low Earth orbit satellite fleet that will deliver high-speed, low-latency global connectivity. As a result, OneWeb now has 394 satellites in low Earth orbit. The company is going to run a network of 648 satellites in total.

The lift-off of the latest launch occurred on...

Kazakhstan has provided Afghanistan with humanitarian aid of food and medicine worth $1.9 million, the Interfax news agency reported, citing the country’s Ministry of Trade and Integration.

The minister of Trade and Integration of Kazakhstan Bakhyt Sultanov has visited Kabul, Afghanistan, according to the press service of the ministry. During a meeting with the Afghan side, an official said that President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev of Kazakhstan entrusted him to give Afghanistan over 5,000 tons of flour as humanitarian aid.

«We have brought 1,500 tons of medicines. In addition, the humanitarian convoy with 155 tons of humanitarian cargo of food and...

President of Russia Vladimir Putin has been named politician of the year as roughly 40% of Russian citizens who participated in a survey by the Russian Public Opinion Research Center (VCIOM) have given their preferences to Putin, the RIA Novosti news agency reported.

Among other popular politicians in Russia are Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov and Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin. 

«A politician of the year for regular Russians is still the president Vladimir Putin as 38% of respondents have chosen him. By a quite large margin, Putin is followed by Sergey Lavrov and Mikhail Mishustin (each of whom received...

New national holding QazBioPharm is going to support biological safety, sustainable development and improvement of biopharmaceutical market infrastructure in Kazakhstan, according to the government decree, which has been published on the website adilet.zan.kz.

In the decree the government has determined the scope of responsibilities of the new holding as promotion of biopharmaceutical science and industry; meeting the needs of the state and society of biopharmaceutical products.

The authorized capital of the holding must be formed by shares of the Scientific Center of Anti-Infective Drugs which belonged to the government of Kazakhstan.

Also, the government has ordered the Committee of State...

One of the biggest enterprises in the city of Ust-Kamenogorsk titanium-magnesium plant has scared locals with bright pink smoke, which comes out of its chimney. Experts from the Department of the Environment for the East Kazakhstan region took air samples.

Neither the plant executives nor local officials confirmed the failure.

«Once our colleagues from the Department of Environment received complaints from local residents, they have conducted an unscheduled inspection at the plant. Once we have all the results of that examination, we will prepare a conclusion. So far, we can’t confirm any failure on the site,» said Rauan Turarov...