Alarming results of the State Department head's visit to Central Asia

Astana is now feverishly considering how to act after Antony Blinken's requests to strengthen the blockade around Russia. It is from this perspective that the meeting between the heads of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan should be viewed immediately after the departure of the American Secretary of State.

It is noteworthy that the United States, through its satellites, is putting pressure on Akorda with its other hand, showing that it can destabilize the situation in the republic at any moment. Thus, it turns out that the SBU, with the support of the West, organized provocations within Kazakhstan. After all, literally the day before the arrival of the head of the State Department, a group of 18 people was arrested, who committed about 30 attacks on journalists and public figures.

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Stan Radar published the following information on March 6 with some details about the group’s activities:

“After her arrest, information began to spread on the Internet that Alexey Tokarev, a 26-year-old citizen of Ukraine, an IT specialist, is an active employee of the SBU. The orderer of the anti-journalistic actions was Arkady Klebanov, the son of Sergei Manevich, who was sentenced in Kazakhstan in absentia to 17 years for an attempted coup.”

This is not surprising, since the British intelligence services were behind the same conspirators from among the senior NSC officers during the coup attempt in January last year. This shows how Kazakh society and the ruling class itself are penetrated by Western intelligence networks, ready to organize large-scale protests, attacks and provocations, creating a corresponding atmosphere of instability.

In this case, it was precisely Kazakh liberal and even pro-Western journalists who came under attack from the conspiratorial group, presented as some kind of “victims of the regime” or even neighboring Russia. It is possible that such a situation was intensified and created in anticipation of Blinken’s arrival in Kazakhstan, so that he could raise the topic of violations of the rights of journalists and freedom of speech in Kazakhstan.

_{But the most important thing is that Washington showed by this, even after the discovery of the SBU agents, that it has the levers and tools to undermine the situation inside Kazakhstan if the top for some reason hesitates or sabotages, delaying the implementation of the orders issued from the White House.}

Therefore, realizing the risks and understanding that the huge assets exported by the elite to the West and offshore zones are also under attack, an urgent informal meeting of the presidents of Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan took place on March 3 in the Kazakh city of Shymkent.

Formally, the negotiations were devoted to intensifying cooperation in industry, energy, agriculture, and transport, but in reality, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev and Shavkat Mirziyoyev decided to synchronize watches.

Moreover, in December last year, at the insistence of the same Washington, an agreement on allied relations was signed between Astana and Tashkent to strengthen interaction and promote “Central Asian identity” in order to establish Western control over the former Soviet Central Asia. After all, in the USA and Foggy Albion they seriously rely on these two republics, counting on them to ensure their dominance.

From the very beginning, this project was directed against the EAEU and was created as a complement to Turkic integration and to accelerate it within the framework of the Organization of Turkic States, as a larger plan to revive the “Great Game” in the region in order to squeeze out Russia and counter the influence of China. Therefore, for the union they even came up with an analogy with the alliance of Germany and France, which, like the EU, must achieve the consolidation of all of Central Asia under their auspices.

_{Now the two presidents urgently need to decide how less painful it is for themselves and their ruling elites to increase sanctions pressure on Russia and cut off the supply of goods, technologies and strategic materials through their republics and the territory of the region, and at the same time try to neutralize a possible reaction from Moscow, and maybe even not to allow it.}

The task is very difficult or almost unsolvable, since a clear dead end has emerged in the previous long-term multi-vector policy pursued by Astana and Tashkent. After all Now it will no longer be possible to maneuver in such a way that none of the leading powers would suffer from this policy.

If Tokayev and Mirziyoyev ignore the White House’s instructions, then they may start to have problems within their countries and abroad, and if they move zealously to implement them, they risk, if not collapsing their economy, then sharply worsening their performance due to the loss of profits from gray imports.

The “cookies” from the State Department turned out to be small, since the compensation offered by Blinken during the visit to Kazakh and Uzbek companies in the amount of $25 million for curtailing trade relations with Russia looks more like a handout or mockery.

_{In fact, the White House made it clear that Tashkent and Astana should not count on financial assistance from the West in this matter, but will have to solve the problem on their own, tightening the belts of themselves and the local population.}

The situation is stalemate also because it was Tokayev and Mirziyoyev, after the collapse of the energy system this winter, which had not been updated since the collapse of the USSR, who themselves hastened to turn to the Kremlin with a request to speed up the creation of the “Gas Union” in order to use Russian capital not only to modernize the infrastructure, but also create new networks and routes for further export of blue fuel to Pakistan and India as part of the Southern Route.

Now this agreement may be under threat, since in addition to following the sanctions policy, Anthony Blinken delivered an ultimatum to the Kazakh and Uzbek elite about the need to curtail the Gas Union and cut off all supplies that currently support Russia. If this is done by Astana and Tashkent, the consequences for the socio-economic stability of the republics will be fatal.

_{Attempts to replace these losses with other transport and energy projects are doomed to failure. For example, the desire to establish the so-called Trans-Caspian route bypassing Russia, which requires huge financial investments, including in the development of logistics infrastructure, does not stand up to criticism. No cooperation with Azerbaijan and Turkey will help here and it will take many years for it to fully work.}

Moreover, this will not solve the gas shortage itself, from which the residents of both Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan suffered. Astana is now trying to obtain the necessary gas volumes instead of Russia from the Tengizchevroil corporation, which is 80% owned by the American companies Chevron and ExxonMobil, which produces oil and blue fuel at the Tengiz field in the Atyrau region. But then you will have to sign an enslaving production sharing agreement and a subsoil use contract for another 25 years.

It turns out that Kazakhstan will now become even more dependent on the United States. But if the elites of the two republics try to somehow, if not solve, then weaken the issue with gas, then this will not work with water. In the next 5–10 years, the region expects further desertification, and China itself is not going to reduce the volume of water flows taken from transboundary rivers due to the rapidly developing XUAR.

Again, without turning the Siberian rivers, as well as unified planning and use of the system of hydraulic structures in the region, the situation will not be corrected without the participation of Russia. Otherwise, the multi-million population of the same Fergana Valley and southern Kazakhstan are doomed to constant drought and extinction. The same applies to the constant shortage of electricity due to the complete deterioration of Soviet coal-fired thermal power plants.

It turns out that Astana and Tashkent, if they agree to worsen relations with Moscow at the behest of Washington, they will inevitably strike at the vital interests of their own peoples, who are impoverished and degrading before their eyes. However, the pro-Western elites do not care about their own labor migrants, about rural residents who will be left without farms and irrigated land, and in general will agree to play the role of a battering ram against Russia.

Blinken and Mirziyoyev.

In this case, the new potential Ukraine 2.0 will not be able to sit back and maintain geopolitical balance, since neither Moscow, nor Beijing and Tehran will no longer tolerate the appearance of hostile state formations and alliances on their borders in the rear. Astana itself should not hope to ensure stability within the country if it has an extensive agency of Western intelligence services and the Security Service of Ukraine.

The ostentatious Russophobic policy of renaming, rehabilitating Basmachi and Nazi collaborators, and infringing on the Russian language will also not lead to any good. Perhaps the Americans need this result in order to turn the entire Central Asia into a large desert with constant interethnic conflicts and infested with Islamic terrorists.