Last Sunday, in another election with no genuine opponents, President Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan won in a landslide. Observers from the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe cited "serious irregularities." Like the deposed Egyptian leader Hosni Mubarak, Nazarbayev has lifted the economy and public expectations but is vulnerable to resentment over corruption, a toxic brew.
Riot police staged a show of force in the capital of ex-Soviet Azerbaijan on Saturday to stop an unauthorised pro-democracy rally and detained dozens of protesters who defied the ban.
Alle reden über Gaddafi, die übrigen Autokraten nutzen die günstige Gelegenheit. So lässt Nursultan Nasarbajew, Herrscher in Kasachstan, sich schnell noch einmal wählen. Seine Gegner sind reine Zählkandidaten - und nur die mutigsten unter seinen Bürgern wagen einen Aufruf zum Wahlboykott.
Zentralasiatische Autokraten werden allmählich alt. Kasachstans Präsident Nasarbajew wurde zwar am Sonntag im Amt bestätigt, doch wie bei den Herrschern in den Nachbarstaaten steht eine Hofübergabe ins Haus.
Lady Thatcher praised Nursultan Nazarbayev for "moving from Communism to Thatcherism" when she visited him in 1991, so impressed was she with policies that helped the Kazakh ruler pull in £75 billion of foreign investment, raise living standards, and stave off the kind of protests that are tearing apart the Arab world.
Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev scored a crushing win Monday in presidential polls that saw him harvest over 95 percent of votes and raised worries about democracy in Central Asia's richest state.
(Reuters) - Kazakhstan's veteran leader Nursultan Nazarbayev celebrated his landslide re-election on Monday but Europe's main monitoring mission said the vote was marred by irregularities and pressed for democratic reforms.
(AP) —Kazakhstan's longtime leader overwhelmingly won re-election in a vote sharply criticized Monday by international monitors who cited numerous cases of ballot box-stuffing, voter intimidation and a lack of transparency.
(Reuters) - Voters will flock to the polls in the Kazakh farming community of Aksu-Ayuly on Sunday with one thing in mind: to extend the rule of their veteran leader for five more years.
