Hungarian MOL and Wintershall of Germany have signed an agreement whereby MOL acquires ownership stakes in 14 offshore oil fields originally licensed to Wintershall in the North Sea. Signed in Budapest on December 13, the agreement is expected to be closed in early 2014 pending... MORE

On November 28, the deputy head of the Department for Multilateral Cooperation at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Kazakhstan, Anuar Tanalinov, said that his country was considering the possibility of taking part in the destruction of Syria’s chemical weapons. According to the Kazakhstani diplomat,... MORE

At the end of November, President Nursultan Nazarbayev said that Kazakhstan should aim to raise its GDP per capita fivefold, to $60,000 from the present $12,000, to join the ranks of the top 30 developed countries. Although Nazarbayev recognizes that Kazakhstan must overcome major challenges... MORE

Kazakhstan plans to introduce new anti-corruption legislation and to rid the judicial system of corruption. But the country has a long way to go to move up from 133rd place in the Corruption Perceptions Index, where it was listed by Transparency International in 2012. Ranked... MORE

Following the recent inter-ethnic clashes in Moscow’s Biryulyovo suburb in mid-October, a growing number of Russia-watchers have been predicting the forthcoming establishment of a new nationalist political party. As Russia’s economic growth is slowing down and the country’s political system is invariably corrupt and inefficient,... MORE

Kazakhstan, as other natural resource-rich countries, faces a difficult task of diversifying its economy and avoiding the resource curse. Indeed, the share of natural resources rents in GDP, which is the sum of oil, natural gas, coal, mineral, and forest rents, in Kazakhstan was 38.2... MORE

With the signing of a new friendship and cooperation treaty at a bilateral summit in Yekaterinburg on November 11, Russia and Kazakhstan aimed to move their relations to a new phase, but tensions related to regional integration evidently remain. Two weeks earlier in Minsk, Kazakhstani... MORE

On November 1, the fourth session of the Kazakhstani-Kyrgyzstani Intergovernmental Council met in Bishkek. The meeting sought to realize the agenda articulated by Kazakhstani Prime Minister Serik Akhmetov, who noted “the mutual desire of Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan to address urgent issues on water and the... MORE

At the October 24 summit of the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council in Minsk, Kazakhstani President Nursultan Nazarbayev suggested that Turkey may wish to join the Custom Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. According to Nazarbayev, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan reached out to him... MORE

A press conference by a regional leader in Kazakhstan, unsurprisingly, seldom attracts much attention. But a recent such press briefing by Nurlan Nogayev, the akim (governor) of the Western Kazakhstan Oblast, has drawn significant notice and may prove to be a turning point in the... MORE