As many of you have probably read by now, Rakhat Aliyev, the wife of Dariga Nazarbayeva and son-in-law to the President of Kazakhstan is the subject of an international police search. The President has issued an order to arrest Aliyev, he has been reported to Interpol to be extradited to Kazakhstan for investigation, but he is apparently on the run, having stated that he wants to stay in Vienna. His homes have been searched. The reason given was his potential involvement in the kidnapping of the Chairman and Vice-Chairman of Nurbank in February. The wife of the CEO wrote an open letter to the President in the the Press, claiming that her husband had called her from captivity and claimed that Rakhat Aliyev had kidnapped him and personally beaten him. A few days after Mr. Timiraliyev returned, he went off apparently to see the financial police, and has not been seen since. His wife, Armangul Kapasheva, has been making quite a bit of noise, convinced that Aliyev has done something to her husband.

Shortly after that, Aliyev was named Ambassador to Austria, having previously been First Vice Minister of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and Special Representative to the OSCE in Vienna. Apparently, ambassadors have immunity from prosecution or investigation, even in Kazakhstan–a privilege not enjoyed by Vice Ministers.

While investigtions have been ongoing, this case recently came back to the limelight when an employee of KTK television, owned by Mr. Aliyev and Nazarybaeyva, went missing and was found beaten. Then last week, Mr. Gilimov, the Vice Chairman of Nurbank who was kidnapped, gave an interview on Astana television channel.

According to his story (which I have no way of verifying or disproving) there was a meeting at Nurbank at which Aliyev, a major shareholder, was present (more…)

I finally found a list of the most important of the constitutional amendments in English and in some detail. It’s actually in the latest news bulletin of the Kazakhstan Embassy to the US, reporting on the new Government Secretary’s speech on the amendments but it has some details of what these reforms mean.

Among some key points that I either misunderstood or wasn’t clear on:

Further, a Prime Minister will now be appointed only with the approval of the majority of the Majilis. Deputies will now need only a simple majority for a vote of no confidence to pass, as opposed to the qualified majority of two thirds of the deputies previously required. Moreover, two thirds of the Constitutional Council, the Central Election Commission and the Accounting Committee will be filled by the Parliament. All these changes will significantly strengthen the role of the legislature.

So Parliament will still formally approve the President’s choice of PM (I got that wrong on some comments on Registan.net and New Eurasia) but now they need a 51% vote to reject the candidate, instead of 67% as before. However, according to Igor Rogov’s recent appearance on the news, the President can veto the Parliament’s rejection.

As far as I understand the Constitutional Council, the Central Election Commission and the Accounting Committee will have two-thirds of its members elected by Parliament–not that these commissions will be filled with MEMBERS of Parliament (you see how hard it is to find accurate language on this?)

Local representative bodies will have a qualitatively new role and will influence the appointment of all levels of executive power locally. Akims (governors) of regions, cities and regions will not be appointed without the approval of the maslikhats.

So Mashlikhats which were previously solely advisory bodies, will now have to approve akims. Mashlikhats are popularly elected.

I’d been having a hard time finding an English language summary of the new amendments that included detailed descriptions so I suggest you read through Saudabayev’s speech.

EDIT: The Embassy sent out the 21 May bulletin but apparently hasn’t put it up on the website yet. So you’ll have to wait a bit.

EDIT THE 2ND: Chris Merriman, besides giving me link love has also linked to the BBC article which is obviously in English and full of yummy details, so that would be another resource to go to.

As Kazakhstan is reforming its system of education in order to join the Bologna Process and to boost its economy, the approach they are taking is potentially controversial. There is a great emphasis on introducing new technology–Kazakhstan will build a number of high-tech classrooms in schools and vocational schools throughout the country and also work on an Internet database for science and research. There is also an emphasis on centralizing authority more, and on matching university education with the needs of the economy, and making education even more specialized (in higher education). While high technology is all well and good, it is interesting to ask what else they might do with the presumably large investments that will go into this new tech. How many more teachers could they train? How many more books could they purchase? How many foreign professors could they hire to come and teach?

As for the other measures–centralization and specialization–some people are pointing out that world experience shows that the best education systems in the world are decentralized and prepare students, not only for a job, but also for world-citizenship by giving them a broad-range of skills and knowledge. Now the theory that a broad liberal arts education is the best in the world, is not without its critics. But one interesting thing to look at is the model of Harvard, which many Kazakhstany students would kill to get into. If this is the case, that Harvard really is the greatest university in the world, then why isn’t Kazakhstan looking to emulate the Harvard model of education?

Recently, after years of debate, Harvard has announced its new core-curriculum, which will prepare undergraduate students in eight areas such as Aesthetic and Interpretive Understanding, Culture and Belief, Ethical Reasoning, and Mathematical Reasoning. These don’t sound like areas of competitiveness in the world market or ways to increase your nation’s rank in the WEF Competitiveness Index!

According to a Kazakhstan-based blog of an English tutor and university placement consultant, Harvard’s new curriculum appears to balance both economic needs and general knowledge. However, instead of preparing workers by forcing them into specialized curricula by field of study or emphasizing specific skills, the curriculum prepares students with a base of fundamental skills like math literacy, logic and basic understanding of science. And in parallel teaching more general skills like cultural literacy and ethics. Specialized training of course comes with the choice of a major, although US universities typically give their students choice, with the assistance of an advisor.

And to the extent that one believes the US education system overall is a world leader, we might note that Harvard is quite the exception for having a core curriculum. Many universities only have one or two required classes, or may have broad areas defined, in each of which students must take one or two classes. So why is Kazakhstan moving away from the US model?

That being said, Kazakhstan is moving toward a European model in many ways, including transferring to a tutor-system wherein students are graded based on independent work with the professor-tutor, as opposed to classwork. They are phasing that in now by requiring students to see their professors outside of class; hopefully after a few years students will be accustomed to going themselves and not need to be forced. Kazakhstan has also finalized the model of higher education so that there are three stages: bachelors, masters and PhD, whereas before there was a 5-year specialist degree and PhD candidates often did not need a masters; they started straight after undergraduate work.

I don’t want to get into a debate about whether the European system or the American system is better at preparing students–I think both are strong. So Kazakhstan may simply have chosen to emulate Oxford and La Sorbonne instead of Harvard, a reasonable choice. Although while European education tends to be more centralized in Europe than in the US, most universities still have a lot more independence than they do in Kazakhstan.

Overall, I suppose my main complaint is that I don’t see a focus on what really matters in the announced changes in education: good teachers, excellent text-books, and well-trained students who know how to learn.

Today Parliament held the second meeting to vote on Amendments to the Constitution. Although most of the amendments proposed today had been discussed earlier, there was one surprise amendment. Parliament today voted to allow the First President of Kazakhstan to run for reelection as many times as he choses to[RU]. (more…)

Several of the proposed amendments to the Constitution were adopted today, according to gazeta.kz in the first reading. Other proposals will be discussed further in a second session on May 18.
Proposals passed today include:

1. The number of Parliament members will indeed be increased as proposed.
2. Mazhilis will be selected by Party slates
3. Parliament will select two-thirds of the Constitutional Council, two-thirds of the Central Election Committee and likewise two-thirds of the Accounting Committee (which audits use of budget funds)
4. Regional advisory organs (Mashilkhats) will serve a 5-year term instead of the current 4 year term
5. The ban on government funding of civil society organizations was lifted

In addition, as per the President’s speech, mechanisms for developing government funding of political parties will be created, and there will be discussion of abolishing capital punishment.

It is not clear currently what amendments will be discussed in two days time, but I will try to post timely updates and as always I am grateful to commenters who correct my mistakes or point me in the direction of good information!

Today, a joint-session of Kazakhstan’s Parliament is meeting to discuss and possibly approve Constitutional Amendments. The President will be present along with the Prime Minister, the akims of the oblasts and major cities, and representatives of the President’s Administration. According to the head of the Constitutional Commission, the proposed amendments will:

• increase the role of political fractions in both forming the government, and writing laws
• increase the role of political parties
• raise the number of members of both the Mazhilis or lower house of Parliament, and the Senate.
• increase the role of civil society organizations.
• introduce an independent court system
• Other reforms will touch upon the procurator’s office and policing bodies that carry out preliminary investigations and inquests.

The Head of the Constitutional Commission did not give details on these reforms, however, the President in his address at the joint-session introduced perhaps the most notable reform, (more…)

According to gazeta.kz, an employee of the KTK television company was kidnapped Thursday morning and held in a cell, though he has since been released. His situation remains critical after he suffered a stroke and potentially numerous concussions. He was taken at KTK headquarters by people in civilian clothes–two of them wearing masks–and driven away in a cavalcade of Mercedes, though one person drove away in a car belonging to KTK. It is not clear how he was released or discovered, but apparently he told doctors that the police beat him.

Apparently he was detained by the police at one point, th0ugh I am unclear whether this was before or after his kidnapping, in connection with Zholdas Timraliyev, who is wanted for financial crimes.

EDIT: Adam Kesher has the full story up on Neweurasia, in Russian. He links this kidnapping as well as the kidnapping and beating of a member of the Presidential Guard to the earlier kidnapping of a director of Nurbank, alledgedly by Rakhat Aliyev. I won’t try to summarize his article, but everyone should read it for themselves.

President Vladimir Putin was in Kazakhstan yesterday and he and President Nazarbayev will be traveling to Turkmenistan this week together. Two issues are on the agenda. First, Russia will be assisting Kazakhstan in enriching uranium for its nuclear energy power center. The two countries will be setting up a joint-uranium enrichment center. It looks like Kazakhstan will provide the uranium and Russia will provide the enrichment center at Angarsk (under the supervision of the International Atomic Energy Commission), and that the goal is to sell the uranium to other countries. Russia had previously offered to enrich uranium for Iran as part of a compromise to allow Iran to continue its nuclear energy program. While the offer fell through, the fact that Russia’s offer was accepted by the US and other nations means that Russia is generally trusted in the area of enrichment, so it seems like this might be a good move for Kazakhstan, to let experienced Russian scientists handle enrichment, while hopefully at the same time, building their own capacity slowly: by learning how to do it from the Russians and by sending their students to the US and other leading nuclear engineering countries. Nothing too controversial here.

The second purpose of the visit may ruffle some feathers in Washington and elsewhere however. Hint: It involves oil (more…)

Help Mark Seidenfeld and Boycott Ducat is a blog dedicated to reporting on the Seidenfeld case, apparently run by his attorney, Derek Bloom. If you want to read up on the case, or express your sympathies, this seems to be the place to go. I am not a lawyer and know little about big business so I am hesitant to give my opinion as if it was authoritative–once we get into takeovers and share prices, I am barely treading water. As an American working here (not in big business), I have never encountered any kind of problems. However, the evidence that Seidenfeld is innocent does seem pretty secure, namely that the money he is accused of stealing has been audited by Price, Waterhouse and Cooper, and in fact was used for what Seidenfeld said it was. In other words, the money isn’t missing, so how could he have stolen it?

In any case, no matter what side you are in, it’s worth reading about it and Help Mark Seidenfeld and Boycott Ducat, while biased in Seidenfeld’s favor has links to all the resources you need to read up on it and form your own opinion.

The Spectator has an article from last week provocatively titled Why Come to Kazakhstan?

According to the article, government controls are getting too tight for many foreign businesses and creating a disincentive to invest there. Most interestingly, the article claims that in terms of energy and mineral resource rights, things are about to get a lot more difficult:

Meanwhile, the straitjacket into which Astana is trying to squeeze foreign corporations is about to be tightened. The country’s subsoil laws, which have been successively reinforced over the years, now grant the state first rights over any energy or mineral wealth. Not content with that, this February the country’s new premier, Karim Masimov, said the government was prepared to alter, and even cancel, existing operating licences (sic) held by foreign energy and mining firms.

This is a controversial issue and there’s certainly reason to believe that foreign companies took advantage of Kazakhstan in its formative years and that many oil companies in particular pushed for some seriously beneficial deals basically saying, “without us, you won’t see a penny of profit on your oil or resources.” However, the fact that everything in Kazakhstan changes all the time, without warning, is likely one of the biggest blocks to cooperation. Projects that have been agreed to by government officials suddenly have to be renegotiated as officials can change several times a year–and apparently new officials are not always debriefed by the previous officeholder. Rules and regulations change, even locations of key offices. Along with the bureaucracy, corruption and strict government control–all cited in the Spectator article and elsewhere ad nauseum*, this love of change (or perhaps lack of appreciation of stability) make Kazakhstan a hard country to work with.

* Perhaps the most notable case of late of problems working in Kazakhstan is that of Mark Seidenfeld, imprisoned for stealing funds from his own company, Golden Telecom. Evidence seems to indicate that he did not steal the funds and his arrest is simply a punishment for not selling his company directly to a Kazakh company but instead offering an open tender. The accusers alleged close relations to powerful government and business people indicate that the trial will not be fair, creating a serious barrier to foreign desire to work in Kazakhstan.