Russian President Vladimir Putin is going to pay an official visit to Kazakhstan on November 27. Moscow expects Kazakhstan to take a clear course on priority cooperation with Russia.
Russia needs Kazakhstan's guarantees for a pro-Russian course. This includes a rejection of nationalism in government structures and elimination of Russophobia, which is deeply rooted in the system of government appointments, as well as in the system of history education, where Russians are presented as colonizers.
In return, the Russian Federation is ready to build a gas pipeline to China through Kazakhstan rather than Mongolia. This will improve Kazakhstan's gasification and bring in transit money. In Kazakhstan, the infrastructure with the necessary potential investment of 40 billion dollars is falling apart. Russia can help there too should Kazakhstan provide guarantees of its pro-Russian course.
Accusing Kazakhstan of following US sanctions does not seem appropriate. There is a large economic dependence on Western oil companies that pay taxes to Kazakhstan. Secondly, Russia is getting parallel imports from Kazakhstan despite all sanctions. The US Treasury imposed sanctions on Kazstanex — a company that played the role of a nominal recipient of machine tools from Europe. The company would receive the equipment and send it to Chinese company Shanghai Winsun which would then supply the tools to Russia. Great Britain imposed sanctions against the same company and five others. Kazakhstan's Elem Group and others were put on the US Treasury list for leaking sanctioned goods to Russia.
The West currently puts maximum pressure on Kazakhstan and threatens to impose more extensive sanctions on the former Soviet republic. If Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev decides not to follow the West, the West may instigate attempts to remove him from power in the 2025 presidential election. No one in the West is going to understand why Kazakhstan does not want to burn bridges in relations with Russia. The West can be loyal only to itself.
It is no coincidence that the President of Kazakhstan instructed the government and local forces to take urgent measures to ensure the security of key military and civilian facilities in connection with the escalation of the crisis in Ukraine.
Tokayev expects Kazakhstan to be destabilized similarly to the Afghanistan scenario under the US occupation. Suffice it to imagine terrorists, drug dealers, etc. coming into Russia through the 7,500-kilometer border with Kazakhstan.