Astana, 28 Feb. US Secretary of State Antony Blinken arrived in Kazakhstan today to meet with authorities from Central Asia’s largest economy and four other partners in a region where Russia has great influence and where China is seeking to expand its role.
This is the first visit as the head of the American diplomacy to Kazakhstan, from where he will leave today for a brief visit to Uzbekistan, where he has never been before as secretary of state American.
“Looking forward to advancing our partnerships in Central Asia,” tweeted Blinken, who landed in Astana in the early hours of the morning.
The Secretary of State will meet in the Kazakh capital with employees of the United States Embassy before holding a bilateral meeting with his counterpart of Kazakhstan, Mukhtar Tleuberdi, and, separately, with the president of that country, Kasim-Yomart Tokáyev .
He will also meet individually with his Kyrgyz colleagues, Jenbeek Kulubáev; from Turkmenistan, Rashid Meredov; and from Tajikistan, Sirojiddin Muhriddin.
Later, he will participate in the ministerial meeting of the five Central Asian countries (the Uzbek minister will join the meeting) in the well-known C5+1 format, in which he will reiterate “the commitment of the United States to the independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity of the countries” of this region.
In addition, the Secretary of State will discuss with his counterparts “the search for solutions to global challenges”, in a veiled reference to the Russian war in Ukraine, in the face of which the majority of Central Asian countries advocate a diplomatic solution and defend territorial integrity.
However, no Central Asian country voted last week in favor of the UN resolution urging Russia to withdraw its troops from Ukraine and end the war.
Kazakhstan is the country that has come out most clearly in favor of these two democratic principles, since Tokayev told Russian President Vladimir Putin in a rostrum last June that he would not recognize the breakaway people’s republics of Lugansk and Donetsk in eastern Ukraine.
However, Russia maintains its influence in the region, both from a political, economic and military point of view with different regional alliances.
Russia has military bases in Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan and sent troops to Kazakhstan in January 2022 as part of the post-Soviet Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) alliance to respond to violent protests that have erupted in this country.
Putin and Chinese President Xi Jinping traveled to Samarkand, Uzbekistan, in September for the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) summit, in what was the Asian president’s first trip outside of China since the start of the pandemic.
There, he urged countries to join forces to resist foreign interference and attempts to instigate popular revolutions in their territories. EFE
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