In Kazakhstan, the violence has eased but questions loom

Kazakhs from Almaty to the rural regions are in shock after rare and bloody protests rocked the nation of 19 million last week. Last week, Nurlan left his apartment in Almaty, Kazakhstan’s largest city and former capital that became the focal point of violent protests, only twice, to quickly buy groceries and scurry back. Some were from neighbouring Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan, he said – also repeating Tokayev’s words about “foreign militants” and “terrorists.” Only nominally Muslim and indifferent to any religion, Nurlan claimed that the “mercenaries” were “bearded radicals” allegedly hired by Kayrat Satybaldy, a nephew of Kazakhstan’s first President Nursultan Nazarbayev. Two days after the protests started, Tokayev sacked Nazarbayev from the Security Council, dissolved the government and dismissed several key security chiefs appointed by the first president known officially as El Basy, “head of the nation.” Tokayev never accused the president’s nephew – whose brother still serves as deputy head of the KNB, or the National Security Committee – of masterminding the violence. “The city is alive, the public transportation is moving, things are quiet, foodstuffs are being delivered to shops,” Alexander, an ethnic Russian graphic designer born and bred in Almaty, told Al Jazeera.