Busy week of diplomacy: Astana insists on keeping talking    

It is expected to be a busy week of international diplomacy for Astana. 

On 1 November the Kazakh capital will be receiving French President Emmanuel Macron, the next day Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban.  

On 3 November Astana will host the leaders of the Organisation of Turkic States, among them Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. 

Kazakhstan’s leadership, old and new, has been often ridiculed for its love of hosting foreign leaders and international events.  

However, given the current spiralling crisis in international relations – the Ukrainian-Russian war, the escalation of the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, to name only the ones that are nearest to our region and are causing scores of human deaths and destruction every day – Astana’s efforts to keep engaging with everyone no longer seem just about vanity.  

Macron and Erdogan are important players in both the above-mentioned conflicts. The fact that President Tokayev will get a chance to have a word with them is a good thing for Kazakhstan.   

For Macron it might be useful to talk to Tokayev about Russia, particularly about what is on the mind of its leader Vladimir Putin – Tokayev has had more meetings with Putin than any other foreign leader, except, of course, Belarusian President Alyaksandr Lukashenka, since Russia’s invasion of Ukraine.  

Another important thing that Macron is likely to discuss with Tokayev is Kazakhstan’s supplies of uranium – 70 percent of electricity generated in France comes from nuclear power.  

Kazakhstan is already a key supplier. The recent coup in Niger, another important uranium supplier to Europe, has made Kazakh supplies even more crucial. Kazakhstan is the world’s largest uranium producer, having provided 43 percent of global world supply in 2022. 

France, and Europe in general, are also getting increasingly interested in Kazakhstan’s vast reserves of critical materials – the minerals important for green energy generation technologies.   

After Astana, Macron will visit Tashkent. His press office said, using the familiar patronising wording, that the visits to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan would be about showing support for their governments’ «reform and modernisation efforts» and desire to «reinforce their links with Europe”.  

It added that France wanted to contribute to the diversification of the two countries’ international ties, and support their independence and sovereignty. 

On 2 November, Tokayev will have talks with Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban. The official reports say the talks will be about furthering cooperation and it looks like they are a sideline event before the summit of the Organisation of Turkic States, in which Hungary is an observer. 

The summit, planned for 3 November, is a scheduled annual event, and no breakthrough accords are expected.  

Besides, the biggest thing on the mind of President Erdogan, the organisation’s most powerful leader, is the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, in which Turkey has a great deal at stake. 

The OTS was set up in 2009 and its other members are Azerbaijan, Kyrgyzstan, and Uzbekistan.  

Ankara has big ambitions for the OTS. However, given the extent of Russian and Chinese influence in Central Asia, turning it into a strong Turkey-led political and economic alliance will be a long game.  

For now, for Central Asia the idea of a hypothetical Turkic union serves only as a ‘moral’ counterweight to Russian and Chinese domination. 

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