Reflecting Astana’s Concerns, Kazakhstan’s Anti-Terrorist Center Prepares Report on Islamic Movement of Eastern Turkestan

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 11 – Kazakhstan’s Anti-Terrorist Center has prepared and released a report on the Islamic Movement of Eastern Turkestan, one the reflects Astana’s concerns that the IMET may pose a threat to Kazakhstan and that calls attention to the fact that many of the post-Soviet states are now preparing similar reports that are seldom attended to by others.

            The ETIM has attracted widespread attention because of its involvement with the Uyghurs in China’s Xinjiang region and has been identified as an extremist group by the United Nations and much of the international community although the US in Nov. 2020 dropped that designation.

            Most of the new Kazakhstan intelligence report is devoted to the history of the ITEM that has been widely reported by others, but its comments about why Kazakhstan is focusing on it now are important. (For a text of the report, see gurk.kz/news/islamskoe-dvizhenie-vostochnogo-turkestana-chto-izvestno-ob-organizaczii.)

            Given Kazakhstan’s location on the border with Xinjiang and the ability of terrorist groups originating in one place to use the Internet to spread their messages and activities, the report says that Astana cannot help but pay attention to what the ITEM is doing, although it must be careful not to overestimate its activities while paying close attention to them.

            The report says that Kazakhstan is now devoting attention to “four potential directions” in the threat that ITEM can pose: “attempts to use the territory of the country as a transit route, the distribution of radical propaganda through the internet, the recruitment of people into foreign terrorism structures and the formation of channels of financial support.”

            According to the report, Kazakhstan gave its “legal assessment” of the ETIM “more than 20 years ago, when it declared it to be a terrorist organization and banned its operations on the territory of the country. In the two decades since, the ETIM has not been able to expand into the territory of Kazakhstan, although it may be able to eventually.

            “On the one hand,” the report says, “there is no evidence which allows fo the conclusion that ‘in Kazakhstan there exist armed groups of the ETIM. But on the other, it would be illogical to think that this is “exclusively a problem of China.” It is too easy for such groups to cross borders that their ideology does not respect.

            This report is important in its own right as a sign of Kazakhstan’s increasing maturity as a state, but it is also significant for those elsewhere who track developments there. The Gurk.kz portal on which it appeared also offers a regular selection of Kazakh government studies of a wide variety of issues and deserves close attention.

‘Nazaccent’ Portal Launches New Podcast Series on the Nationality Question in Russia and Devotes Its First Programs to Ethnic Russians and Their State

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 10 – Traditionally, what Moscow calls “the nationality question” is all about ethnic minorities and their relations with the state; but Nazaccent, the leading Russian Federation portal on ethnic relations, has upended that approach in its new podcast series on the nationality question.  The first issues focus on the ethnic Russians and their state.

            The first podcast is devoted to the way in which ethnic diversity is a resource for the Russian state, the second is on the well being of the ethnic Russian people, the third is on ethnic Russian mastery of its Arctic shores, and the fourth is devoted to the role of ethnic Russians in the North Caucasus.

            (Nazaccent’s report about its launch of this new series can be found at nazaccent.ru/content/46160-nacionalnyj-akcent-zapustil-podkasty-o-nacionalnom-voprose-v-rossii/ and links to these and other podcasts that portal has produced and posted on Facebook at youtube.com/@Nazaccent.)

            This shift in the traditional focus of Russia’s nationality question from the non-Russians to the ethnic Russian majority is a clear echo of Putin’s elevation of the Russians as the state-forming nation of his country and his moves to reduce the status of non-Russians to a cultural phenomenon.

            But it may have the unintended consequences not only of infuriating many of the non-Russians who thought that they could at least be the focus of Moscow discussion of “the nationality question” but also of prompting them to reflect on the ways in which the relationship between ethnic Russians and the non-Russians may ultimately lead to the demise of the empire.

            One of the most useful discussions of that possibility was offered in a book published abroad more than 60 years ago by Russian émigré I.A. Kurganov entitled The Peoples of the USSR and the Russian Question (in Russian, Munich, 1961) in which he focused on the way that Russian attitudes toward non-Russians will define Russia’s future. 

Russia’s Political Leaders Mistakenly Ignoring Growing Pessimism in the Population, ‘Nezavisimaya Gazeta’ Says

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 11 – The results of several polls released last week show that pessimism among Russians is on the rise, although the share of those who think that the situation will improve or at least not get worse remains greater, according to a lead article by the editors of Nezavisimaya Gazeta.

            But it is a mistake to ignore the rising tide of pessimism, the editors say, because pessimists “have developed the habit of relying on themselves and their own possibilities as they do not believe in politics or politicians as a way to achieve change of any kind” (ng.ru/editorial/2026-11-11/2_9622_red.html).

            Because of that attitude, the pessimists “aren’t trying to convert their mood into political behavior,” the article says; and as a result, those in power are satisfied with the situation” and are ignoring the implications of a society where the number of pessimists is growing as rapidly as in the case of the Russian Federation.

To ignore such pessimism is to ignore the possibility that it “can grow into pronounced discontent” and to fail to try to ensure that there are legal channels for its expression. If there aren’t, there is a danger that when the amount of pessimism passes a certain point, those with that attitude will seek alternative means to achieve their ends that may challenge those in power.

For the time being, the powers that be feel no such threat; and discussions of pessimism remain confined to sociological studies and commentaries. But there is no guarantee that this will remain the case; and failure to reflect on that possibility could lead to a disaster at some point in the future when those in power will have to rely more on the attitudes of the population. 

Moscow Set to Allow Russians to File Denunciations on Line, a Move Likely to Increase Amount of Political Snitching to Unprecedented Levels

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 9 – Russians who want to denounce other Russians for violating the law or state policies will no longer have to appear or write on paper such “snitching,” if a new proposal by the interior ministry goes into effect. Instead, they will be able to snitch via the internet.

            That will make it easier for Russians to denounce their neighbors especially for political “crimes” like offending the feelings of believers or spreading fakes about the Russian army because in such cases, those snitching won’t have to appear (t.me/endoflaw/4132 repeated at echofm.online/news/mvd-razreshit-rossiyanam-pisat-onlajn-donosy).

            Consequently, the number of denunciations for political crimes is likely to expand dramatically in the coming months. At the same time, however, because those who snitch about ordinary crimes like theft will still have to make an appearance before the authorities, reports about actions of those kinds are less likely to grow.

Young Russians Caught in ‘Paternalistic Trap,’ New Study Finds, with Many Expecting to Deliver Basic Social Guarantees but No Longer Trusting It to Do So

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 10 – Young Russians expect the state to deliver the basic social guarantees it has promised but no longer trust that it will do so, leaving them in “a paternalistic trap” and putting this critical social contract at risk of collapse in the event of shocks, according to a new study of students in Yekaterinburg universities.

            The study by Urals Federal University scholars Yekaterina Zaytseva and Irina Britvina is entitled “Life Strategies of Students in Yekaterinburg as a Reflection of the State of the Social Contract” (in Russian) is in the latest issue of the Courier of the Institute of Sociology and is available at fnisc.ru/index.php?page_id=2624&jn=vestnik&jn=vestnik&jid=1171.

            It is discussed in detail by Yevgeny Chernyshov, a Nakanune journalist who follows social and political trends in the Urals region, at https://www.nakanune.ru/articles/125255/. In his review, the journalist says that the findings of this study call into question assumptions that all is rosy in relations between young Russians and the Russian state.

            The survey Zaytseva and Britvina carried out found that the vast majority of students (79 percent) have paternalistic expectations about the state and believe that the state much live up to its promises to provide high incomes, housing, medical care and the like. But just over half of these felt the Russian government is currently living up to its half of the bargain.

            According to the authors, “young people have not broken ties with the state physically but are alienated from it psychologically, no longer seeing any meaning in continuing a dialogue with the authorities.” Indeed, the authors say, young Russians “do not perceive the state as a party to which a contract is possible or necessary.”

            University students in Yekaterinburg thus believe they must make their own way and not count on the state to come through, a situation which could have serious political consequences in the event of a shock, Chernyshov says, one ever more likely to arise because the internet spreads imagery of the failings of the Russian state now to fulfill its promises. 

Future Commercial Rewards from Expanded Arctic Shipping ‘Surprisingly Small,’ European Scholars Say, but ‘Environmental and Geopolitical Risks Remain Substantial'

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 9 – Many have accepted Moscow’s vision that the Arctic will be a major route for maritime shipping, Boris Vergote says; but the rewards from the retreat of sea ice may be “surprisingly small” while “the environmental and geopolitical risks” are likely to “remain substantial.”

            Vergote, one of the co-authors of a 56-page study of these issues by European scholars, says that their research shows that Arctic routes are indeed shorter but that by itself doesn’t mean they are more cost effective or less risky. (The full text of the report itself is available online at  cdn.bfldr.com/WF0QU2QB/as/k97r4kr5v4m7r9ggnn5zr9/Systemiq_-_Breaking_the_Ice_Report A detailed discussion of its key findings can be found at arctictoday.com/arctic-shipping-brings-shorter-routes-but-few-rewards-new-research-finds/.)

            Among the greater costs that shippers using the Northern Sea Route or other Arctic routes must bear are building ice-capable ships, higher insurance premiums, lower speeds, and sparse infrastructure on shore in the case of accidents or for intermediate stops, the last of which is a major component for container shipping elsewhere.

            As a result and despite boosterism in Moscow, Beijing and some other centers, the report says, shipping in the Arctic is unlikely to form more than 0.2 percent of global maritime trade by value in 2050 because shippers who use these routes will save only 100 million US dollars by doing so, a drop in the bucket of spending on oceanic shipping worldwide.

            The European report also stresses that such shipping will cause serious environmental damage and will likely involve geopolitical competition among major powers given the location of Russia along much of the route and the US location at the entrance of the Arctic from the Pacific.

            The report thus serves as a useful corrective to the enthusiasm of some and the fears of others that the Northern Sea Route and other Arctic shipping lanes will soon radically transform international trade routes. Arctic routes may play a key role in the extraction of resources there, but they won’t transform international trade in the near term nearly as much as some suggest.

 

Russia’s Muslim Leaders Support Tokayev’s Proposal for Russia to Become Associate of Organization of Turkic States

Paul Goble

            Staunton, Nov. 6 – At the Organization of Turkish States summit in Ankara on October 30, Kazakhstan President Kasym-Jomart Tokayev proposed having the Russian Federation participation in an associate capacity with the OTS, something Russia’s Muslim leaders welcomed but that a senior Turkish official has questioned because of language requirements.

            Tokayev’s proposal (akorda.kz/en/kassym-jomart-tokayev-addresses-the-13th-summit-of-the-organization-of-turkic-states-319348) drew immediate support from the leaders of Russia’s senior Muslim Spiritual Directorates who clearly view the idea as something that would elevate their status (altyn-orda.kz/rossijskie-musulmane-podderzhali-ideyu-tokaeva-o-vstuplenii-rossii-v-tyurkskij-soyuz-chto-zayavili-v-moskve/).

            But a senior Turkish political official questioned the idea given that the OTS requires that its members speak a Turkic language, something those in power in Russia clearly do not do, a reaction that makes it unlikely Tokayev’s call will gain traction (timesca.com/turkish-official-questions-tokayevs-proposal-of-ots-observer-status-for-russia/).

            This back and forth recalls both the ongoing debate in Turkish nations over whether Pan-Turkism should be “large” or “small” (cronos.asia/news/bolshoy-i-malyy-pantyurkizm-pochemu-raskalyvaetsya-tyurkskiy-mir/) and the presentation to Turkish President Erdogan in November 2021 of a map showing the Turkic peoples of Russia as part of the Turkic world (caucasuswatch.de/en/news/nationalists-presented-erdogan-map-of-turkic-world-with-regions-of-southern-russia.html).

The appearance of that map provoked a violent response by Russian commentators who declared that even if the OTS expanded, it would never include nations like the Republic of Sakha in the Russian north (windowoneurasia2.blogspot.com/2022/01/greater-turan-will-never-include.html).