Mongolia’s Minister of Foreign Affairs L. Bold made an official visit January 16–21, 2014 to the PRC at invitation of his counterpart Wang Yi. The most interesting result from the trip may have been the fact that it was widely covered by Chinese media, while... MORE

President Nursultan Nazarbayev has suggested changing his country’s name from Kazakhstan to “Kazakh Yeli”—meaning the “Land of the Kazakhs”—during a visit to the nation’s oil capital Atyrau on February 6. By dropping the “stan” from Kazakhstan, the country would differentiate itself from its Central Asian... MORE

On February 5, President Nursultan Nazarbayev held his annual meeting with the foreign ambassadors and lead representatives of the local offices of major international organizations in Astana. More than 80 senior foreign diplomats accredited to Kazakhstan heard the president’s speech at the Akorda presidential residence... MORE

China is increasingly interested in railway construction in the former Soviet Central Asian states as a land alternative to maritime transit for shipping high-value, low-volume products such as electronics to European markets. If all goes according to plan, in May 2014 the final technical decisions... MORE

On January 30–31, the deputy prime ministers of Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, Tokon Mamytov and Murodali Alimardon took part in negotiations to try to relieve tensions from recent border clashes, which involved exchanges of fire between their border guards. Mamytov and Alimardon reached an agreement to... MORE

On February 4, 2014, Kazakhstan and El Salvador established diplomatic relations. Kazakhstan’s permanent representative to the United Nations, Kairat Abdrakhmanov, and his Salvadorian counterpart, Enrique Garcia Gonzalez, signed a communiqué to this end in New York on January 30 (Trend, February 4). On January 16,... MORE

On January 17, Kazakhstani President Nursultan Nazarbaev delivered his annual address to the nation, titled “Kazakhstan’s way—2050: common aim, common interests, common future.” The address largely elaborated on the national development plan and ways to achieve the goal of bringing Kazakhstan into the group of... MORE

On January 22, Kazakhstani President Nursultan Nazarbayev arrived in Davos to attend the 44th session of the World Economic Forum and held a number of bilateral meetings. These included, among others, private conversations with high-level officials of the European Union, the European Bank for Reconstruction... MORE

Amid an ongoing domestic political scandal, Uzbekistan may face another wave of investment capital flight. On January 2, British-Canadian Tethys Petroleum announced its decision to leave Uzbekistan and focus on projects in Kazakhstan and Tajikistan. Tethys Petroleum is a public company listed on the Toronto... MORE

In his January 17 State of the Nation Address, Kazakhstani President Nursultan Nazarbayev reaffirmed the core long-term vision of stable economic development found in the “Kazakhstan-2050” national development strategy that he proposed in his December 2012 address. For example, the president wants to increase Kazakhstan’s per capita... MORE