Kazakhstan President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has ordered security forces to “kill without warning” those participating in unrest, opening the door for a dramatic escalation in a crackdown on anti-government protests that have turned violent.
In a televised public announcement on Friday, the defiant Russian-backed president claimed the unrest, which began earlier this week as protests against rising fuel prices, had been masterminded by well-trained “terrorist bandits” from both inside and outside the country.
Tokayev also said a contingent of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a Russian-led military alliance made up of former Soviet states, has arrived in the country “for a short period of time” to carry out the functions of defense and support.
This past week has seen the worst street demonstrations the country has seen after gaining independence from Russia three decades ago, according to CTV News Canada.
State media reported Friday that 18 security personnel and 26 “armed criminals” had been killed in violent protests. More than 3,000 people have been detained. In Almaty, the country’s largest city, several dead bodies riddled with bullets lay in the streets and the air was repeatedly filled with gunfire, according to a journalist in the area.
The demonstrations began over a near-doubling of prices for a type of vehicle fuel but quickly spread across the country, reflecting wider discontent with authoritarian rule.
On Friday morning, Russia’s state news agency Tass reported that the building occupied by the Kazakh branch of the Mir broadcaster, funded by several former Soviet states, was on fire.
Tokayev’s speech attempted to undermine the narrative that the demonstrations were a product of popular unrest that turned increasingly destructive and deadly. He said the violence was the product of a well-organized enemy, armed with sleeper cells carrying out “terrorist attacks.”
“Their actions showed the presence of a clear plan of attacks on military, administrative and social facilities in almost all areas, coherent coordination of actions, high combat readiness and bestial cruelty,” Tokayev said. “They need to be destroyed.”
However, several protesters who spoke to international media rejected that characterization. “We are neither thugs nor terrorists,” one woman said. “The only thing flourishing here is corruption”
It could be said that the protests and violence in the oil-rich country stem from fuel prices expanding, leading to further discontent with the government over corruption, living standards, poverty and unemployment – all made worse by the COVID-19 pandemic.
“This is a government that is highly detached from the reality of what happens on the ground. It’s a country where there are no institutions through which to protest; the only route is on the streets,” Paul Stronski of the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace told CNN.
