A row has erupted in northern Kazakhstan over the erection of a monument to Russian Tsar Nicholas II, who is reviled by many Kazakhs for his association with the bloody suppression of an uprising in 1916.

The Kazakh government has a delicate balancing act between Russia and China, according to an opinion article by David Clark in The New Statesman, Britain’s weekly current affairs magazine, on August 4.

On August 4, 2015 at the George Washington University, the Kazakh Research Institute of Culture supported by the Embassy of Kazakhstan to the USA held the premiere screening of the two-part documentary film «Dasht-I-Kipchak: Secret Signs» within celebration of the 550th Anniversary of the Kazakh Khanate.

CIS states, such as Russia and Kazakhstan, have sought to manipulate the extradition process in order to persecute opponents, write Ben Keith and Rebecca Niblock.

The government of Kazakhstan tries to use a U.S. federal statute to take down an opposition newspaper. Central Asia may be one of the least economically integrated regions extant, but the countries remain as tapped into Western legal structures as any – especially when attempting to smother opposition voices. The latest bit of legal manipulation came last year, when the Kazakhstani government used the Computer Fraud and Abuse Act (CFAA), a U.S. federal statute, to sue unnamed “Doe” defendants in federal court in New York.

Small and medium-size states such as Kazakhstan survive and do well when, like good surfers, they learn to ride and take advantage of new geopolitical waves. Conversely, they fail when they ignore them. Kazakhstan now has a new opportunity. Sweeping across Central Asia is the One Belt, One Road (OBOR) initiative launched by China’s President Xi Jinping. The origins of this initiative are complex. It could be an effort to counterbalance the clear dominance of the United States in the maritime sphere. It could also be an effort to revive Central Asia’s key role in world history.