Kazakhstan - China Relations
Unrest in Kazakhstan started as a protest of fuel price hikes in the Mangystau region on January 2 before spreading to half of the country in the following days. Kazakh President Tokayev invited troops from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), led by Russia and not including China. Tokayev had another option: the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO), led by China but also including Russia. Despite growing cooperation between Moscow and Beijing in opposing US policies worldwide, the two are competitors in Central Asia.
On 06 January 2022, leader Xi Jinping spoke to President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, assuring him he would support the country against foreign interference. China strongly rejects any attempt by external forces to provoke unrest and instigate a "color revolution" in Kazakhstan, as well as any attempt to harm the friendship between China and Kazakhstan and disrupt the two countries' cooperation. China is ready to provide necessary support to help Kazakhstan overcome the difficulties, Xi said.
On 09 January 2022, China’s Foreign Minister Wang Yi called Kazakh Deputy Prime Minister and Foreign Minister Mukhtar Tileuberdi, pledging “necessary support and assistance to the Kazakh side.” An editorial in the Global Times also made clear that “China needs security coordination with neighbouring countries over Kazakhstan.” It was claimed that due to “China’s Belt and Road Initiative and its energy imports, the Central Asian state's stability represents a high stakes issue.”
While Russia had taken the lead regarding the crisis in Kazakhstan, the consensus in Beijing is that China cannot stand on the sidelines and allow a potentially hostile government to take over in a strategically important neighbour. This puts its decades-old ‘non-interference’ policy to the test. Beijing stated that it is willing to strengthen law enforcement and security cooperation with Kazakhstan to help resist foreign interference.
Chinese Ambassador to Kazakhstan Zhang Xiao on 12 January 2022 said that China is willing to enhance cooperation with the law-enforcement and security departments of the Central Asian country, broaden bilateral collaboration in countering external interference, safeguard the political systems and state powers of the two countries, and guard against and oppose any plots of "color revolution."
Kazakhstan is a strategically crucial state, as it sits on China’s western frontier and is a pivotal part of the Belt and Road initiative connecting to Europe, as well as China’s own energy security. Kazakhstan has been a major destination for Chinese investment, particularly as part of Beijing's Belt and Road Initiative. Competition and collaboration coexist in Chinese-Russian relations in Central Asia. Russia and China can work together on security issues, such as terrorism and narcotics, desipte their rivalry on the economic front. China's vulnerability to attacks on shipping and pipelines, could strike at the heart of the Chinese economy. Chinese measures to secure the pipeline have included consultations between the security departments of China, Kazakhstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan.
On January 3, 1992, the Republic of Kazakhstan set up diplomatic relations with the People's Republic of China. Since 2015, Shakhrat Nuryshev holds the post of Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan to China. In addition to the Embassy in Beijing (since December 1992), the Republic of Kazakhstan has set up a consulate general in Hong Kong (since August 2003) and Shanghai (since May 2005), passport and visa service office in Urumqi (from March 1995), respectively. The Chinese Embassy in Kazakhstan is located in Astana City and consulate-general in Almaty (from August 2007).
The two countries saw remarkable results in their trade and economic cooperation and continued progress in cooperation in energy, non-resource and other sectors. Kazakhstan has become China's second largest trading partner in the Commonwealth of the Independent States only next to Russia, while China became the largest trading partner of Kazakhstan.
Kazakhstan – China collaboration characterized by high dynamics of contacts at the highest levels, and imposing legal base. Legal base of this bilateral relations consists of more than 230 contracts and agreements in different areas, among which are the most fundamental agreements as the Treaty of Good-Neighborliness and Friendly Cooperation signed in December 2002 in Beijing and the Joint Declaration of the heads of state of the Republics of Kazakhstan and China on a new stage of comprehensive strategic partnership (August 2015, Beijing).
Kazakhstan consistently supported China's position on issues related to Taiwan, Tibet and combating the East Turkistan Islamic Movement (ETIM). The two countries enjoyed sound cooperation in the United Nations, the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Conference on Interaction and Confidence-building Measures in Asia (CICA), and other frameworks. Kazakhstan supported China in taking over the CICA chairmanship in 2014.
Kazakhstan-China bilateral trade reached $12 billion in 2008, making China one of Kazakhstan's largest trading partners. China is also one of the largest sources of foreign investment for Kazakhstan, with Chinese companies investing $692 million in 2008. Kazakhstan, which shares a border with China's restive Xinjiang region, has been on diplomatic tiptoes since its major trading partner began to send ethnic Kazakhs to internment camps under its anti-extremism policy.
In reaction to 2009 events in China, Kazakhstani Uighur groups criticized the Chinese government and staged protests in Almaty. Many Kazakhstani Uighurs emigrated from Xinjiang or are the descendants of immigrants. An estimated 70,000-120,000 Uighurs entered the Soviet Union from China in the early 1960's. That Kazakhstani Uighurs have become so exercised about the unrest in Xinjiang reflects the fact that many are from families who immigrated from Xinjiang and many still have relatives there.
Bulat Sultanov, Director of the Kazakh Institute of Strategic Studies, a government-sponsored think tank, told the press on 08 July 2009 that "massive disorders in Urumqi (i.e. the capital of XUAR) may have negative consequences for Kazakhstan, since the XUAR accounts for 70 percent of trade between Kazakhstan and China."
On 10 July 2009, Kakharman Kozhamberdiyev, Deputy Head of the World Congress of Uighurs, told the media that events in Xinjiang "were the result of the totalitarian regime in China and simply continue the long-lasting rights infringements against the Uighur people." Kozhamberdiyev added that the WCU's ultimate goal is to separate Xinjiang from China and found a sovereign state, and asked, "how can a region, with more than nine million Uighurs and abundant natural resources and close ties with Central Asian culture, not pursue independence and establish its own country?"
Russia is "not an attractive model" for Kazakhstan's social and economic development. The Central Asian country's political leadership and society have "other models," from Europe to Turkey to Singapore. The most compelling development model was provided by China, which quickly had become Kazakstan's largest non-CIS trading partner. The Kazakstani leadership found the Chinese combination of rigid social control and private-sector prosperity an attractive one. China also represented a vast market and appeared quite able to supply the food, medicine, and consumer goods most desired by the Kazakstani market.
However, the relationship with China has been a prickly one. Kazakstan's fears of Chinese domination remain from the Soviet era and from the Kazaks' earlier nomadic history. A large number of Kazaks and other Muslims live in the Xinjiang Uygur Autonomous Region of China, just over the border. Direct rail and road links have been opened to Ürümqi in Xinjiang, and Chinese traders in Kazakstan are prominent in the thriving barter between the two nations. However, China was plainly nervous about any contact that would encourage separatist or nationalist sentiments among its own "captive peoples." For its part, Kazakstan has expressed unease about the large numbers of Chinese who began buying property and settling in the republic after the end of Soviet rule. Kazakstan also has reacted angrily but without effect to Chinese nuclear tests at Lob Nor, China's main testing site, located within 300 kilometers of the common border.
China National Petroleum Corporation (CNPC) is China's largest oil and gas producer and supplier. CNPC has been operating in Kazakhstan since 1997 and is now engaged in E&P activities, oil/gas pipeline construction and operation, refining and oil product sales, as well as oilfield services. Currently, we have oil and gas investment in AktobeMunaiGas, PK, Mangistau, Kashagan, North Buzachi, ADM, and KAM. Moreover, CNPC is the EPC contractor of the Kazakhstan-China Crude Oil Pipeline, the Kazakhstan-China Gas Pipeline, the Beineu-Shymkent Gas Pipeline, and the Kenkiyak-Atyrau Crude Oil Pipeline, and jointly operates these pipelines with Kazakh partners.
On January 3, 2022, President Xi Jinping exchanged congratulatory messages with First President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev and Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev to celebrate the 30th anniversary of the establishment of diplomatic ties between the two countries. In his congratulatory message to Nazarbayev, Xi Jinping pointed out, since the establishment of diplomatic ties 30 years ago, China-Kazakhstan relations have kept advancing with the times and breaking new ground, and always maintained the momentum of robust development, setting a good example of neighboring countries upholding good-neighborliness and pursuing win-win cooperation. I highly appreciate the fact that First President Nazarbayev has firmly followed a friendly policy towards China and made outstanding contributions to advancing bilateral ties and deepening Belt and Road cooperation.
Nazarbayev said, China was one of the first countries to recognize Kazakhstan's independence. The two sides have established a permanent comprehensive strategic partnership on the basis of mutual trust and mutual respect. Kazakhstan is ready to work with China to push for greater development of bilateral cooperation in various fields.
Tokayev said, since the establishment of diplomatic ties 30 years ago, Kazakhstan and China have set a good example for the international community to develop state-to-state relations, and have become an important factor for stability and prosperity in the Eurasian region. The two sides have completely resolved the boundary question left over from history, and built the shared border between the two countries into a bridge of friendship and unity between Kazakhstan and China. I would like to work with you to make greater efforts for the development of Kazakhstan-China relations.
With "constitutional order" in Kazakhstan restored after the government took firm measures to deal with the unrest, which has engulfed half of the country for a few days, and the arrival of troops from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), on 07 January 2022, Chinese President Xi Jinping sent condolences to Kazakh President Tokayev for the severe casualties and losses from the unrests. Xi said that Tokayev took affirmative and effective measures at a crucial time, quickly quelled the situation, and showed a statesman's responsibility to the country and the people.
Xi stressed that China firmly opposes any force that destroys the stability and security of Kazakhstan, opposes outside forces that incite disturbances or color revolution or try to destroy the friendship and cooperation between China and Kazakhstan. China is willing to offer help that Kazakhstan needs to overcome the current difficulties. No matter meeting what challenges and risks, China is always the trustworthy friend and partner of Kazakhstan, and the Chinese people always stand with Kazakh people, Xi said.
Stability in Kazakhstan may also influence China's Northwest region, especially the Xinjiang region. It was worrisome on whether the chaos in Kazakhstan will spill over into other countries in Central Asia, as outside forces and extremism could infiltrate the region via the internet and incite trouble through videos and words.
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