The news portal 902.gr has published an interview with Eliseos Vagenas, member of the CC of the Communist Party of Greece (KKE) and Head of the International Relations Section of the CC of the KKE, concerning the developments in Kazakhstan:
— The recent mass mobilizations in Kazakhstan have led to violent conflicts and the intervention of military forces to suppress them. President Tokayev spoke of foreign intervention, of 20,000 foreign militants, which was followed by the military intervention of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) countries. The question arises: Were these mobilizations based on internal developments or was it truly a foreign intervention as in the case of Ukraine a few years ago?
— The root cause of the mass people’s mobilization that took place in Kazakhstan lies in the enormous social and economic problems that the restoration of capitalism has caused to the people of this country.
Millions of people live on very low wages and pensions, millions are unemployed, others are forced to commute to the internal part of the country or to Russia to earn a wage. Millions of young people, in a society where the average age is low, are desperate regarding their future which seems obscure.
At the same time, it is obvious that capitalists live in luxury, that the energy wealth is being looted by local capitalists as well as foreign monopolies, such as US Chevron corporation. Overall, the US, British, and EU monopolies control 75% of the mining sector of the industry, which is the most important in this country. The energy wealth is also directed to the EU, Russia, and China, which are important importers of the energy wealth of the country.
The huge social differentiation led to harsh workers’ struggles. How did the authorities respond? 10 years ago in the city of Zhanaozen the regime’s security forces murdered thousands of workers in strike. There was an intensification of repression; among other things, the CP of Kazakhstan was banned while until today they deny the legalization of the Socialist Movement of Kazakhstan, they banned more than 600 trade unions by adopting new trade union laws in order to fully control the trade union movement. Moreover, an effort was launched to support the nationalist forces, including the justification of the local Nazi collaborators, i.e. the so-called “Turkestan SS legion”, which acted during the Second World War.
The anti-popular economic and s
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