Painful (0)
I heard that prison conditions are bad in Kazakhstan, but seriously? You’d rather castrate yourself than be extradited back to Kazakhstan?
Can we follow this Eurostandar… (0)
Can we follow this Eurostandard please? Less work, more productivity, more free time in Germany than the US: http://bit.ly/9YQpK2
Killing the Future – Transitio… (0)
Killing the Future – Transitions Online Uzbek and Turkemn education http://t.co/RyNQYfj via @AddThis
Old post but I’ve heard of thi… (0)
Old post but I’ve heard of this happening to friends. DHL charges extra to “get things through customs” http://bit.ly/9enUqW
Controversial and Ambitious (0)
A couple of articles came out recently about Beibut Shumenov, Kazakhstan’s boxing champion. In an interview with Fight Hype, Gabriel Campillo says he was robbed of victory over Shumenov in the title fight in Las Vegas and wants a rematch. Both the Spanish boxer and the interviewer seem to agree that Campillo clearly won the January fight, which was itself a rematch after a scandal in Kazakhstan last year. According to Campillo, Shumenov starts out strong and throws a lot of punches but tires himself out quickly.
Apparently though Shumenov has no desire to defend his past and is looking to the future to win another world title:
“I want a unification fight next,” Shumenov said. “I’m ready to fight any of the other champions now. (Jean) Pascal and (Tavoris) Cloud are both good champions and I’d love to fight either one. Throw in world champion Jurgen Brahmer, too. My goal is to unify the titles. I have a lot of respect for all of the other champions but I want their titles.”
“It’s unheard of, a fighter that wants one challenge after another so early in their career,” said Dan Goossen of Goossen Tutor Promotions. “But this is what boxing needs, the most competitive and biggest fights that can be made. The networks should ONLY be looking at these young champions to be facing off with one another. Beibut wants to give the fans want they want to see.”
Ambitious, shameless or crazy? In any case, Shumenov is the only Kazakh world champion in history. Aratoly Alexandrov, Oleg “Big O’ Maskaev and Vassily “The Tiger” Jirov are all from Kazakhstan, according to gazeta.kz but I assume by their names that they are ethnicaly not Kazakh. So Shumenov will probably have to screw up royally before Kazakhstan stops cheering for him.
RT @robertsreport: USAID shoul… (0)
RT @robertsreport: USAID should fund tea party activists to go to Kyrgyzstan and test theory of how to develop a country without government
Fishy Language Policy (0)
Apologies for the pun in the title. Couldn’t resist.
Apparently a shop in Aktobe is being sued by a customer for being unable to explain a tin of fish in Kazakh. The language law says that all consumer information must be available in Kazakh. For those who don’t live here, all products made in Kazakhstan have product information in both languages. Most products made abroad are targeted for the former Soviet Union and have information in any combination of Russian, Kazkh, Ukranian, Belarussian, Kyrgyz, Uzbek, Armenian, Azerbaijanian and sometimes even Korean, Mongloian, Chinese, and other obscure languages.
Foreign products that do not have information in Russian or Kazakh have labels glued to them with that information. No idea who does it, whether it’s customs or the shop or the distributor, but everything made in Europe from frozen fish sticks to mac and cheese to shampoo to glass cleaner has a white label with nutritional information, preparation instructions and warnings as well as the name of the manufacturer in Kazakh and Russian (it’s especially amusing when the preparation instructions are different from the original). So I’m not sure how this tin of fish slipped through the cracks. Interesting to see how this turns out.
As the Eurasianet article points out, chances are the buyer knew what to do with the fish and this law suit is probably designed to just raise attention to the contentious issue of Kazakh language use in Kazakhstan.
Prison Riots (0)
Disturbing news from Kazakhstan’s prisons. Prisoners have been mutilating themselves and 38 were injured during a riot in Akmola oblast last week. Prisoners claim that they are routinely beaten and tortured, that prisons are overcrowded, and that there is no complaint system. The government claims that there is a complaint system in place which is effective and that most complaints “prove not to be true.”
Nonetheless it is hard for the government to ignore self-mutilation and one prisoner who allegedly set himself on fire. The BBC article linked above has some disturbing pictures of the inmates’ injuries.
One interesting note that has come out of this is that Kazakhstan far more prisoners than other post-Soviet countries or Europe:
According to a report by the UN Special Rapporteur on Torture, Manfred Nowak, the prison population in Kazakhstan is three times the average in Europe and well above the number in other post-Soviet countries. At the beginning of 2010 there were nearly 64,000 prisoners in Kazakh jails. Officials say that number has now been reduced to just over 60,000.
Nowak came to Kazakhstan in May of this year and noted many “
Giffen Trial Ends Not in a Bang (0)
After prosecuting James Giffen for seven years, Giffen pled guilty to avoiding paying taxes by failing to give information about a foreign bank account in his 1996 tax return. As for the accusation that he bribed government officials in Kazakhstan for oil deals to the tune of $84 million, well apparently consultants will be consultants.
Steve Levine, author of The Oil and the Glory, has been the go-to-guy to read about this case and he predicted that Giffen was trying to prolong things by claiming he was ordered by the CIA to try to bribe Kazakh officials. Apparently, the government would prefer to drop the charges of bribery rather than reveal intelligence documents.
Kazakhstan has been quiet about this case and many citizens don’t even know about it. However $84 million found in secret bank accounts was frozen in 2007. That money is independently managed and is being used to help children and increase oil industry transparency in Kazakhstan. However allegations go unanswered that Giffen paid for:
…expensive speedboats, fur coats, jewelry, and tuition for a Nazarbayev daughter to an exclusive Swiss school.
Camelot and Kazakhstan (0)
This promotional film about Camelot Castle, a luxury hotel overlooking Tintagel, the birth place of King Arthur of legend, happens to feature a celebration of the birthday of President Nazarbayev. Not that the President came to the event:
Camelot Castle Celebration – The Secret of Camelot Castle from Camelot Castle on Vimeo.
The owners of the hotel are a British couple one of whom was born in Astana. The husband notes that he held the event in gratitude for what Nazarbayev has done for his family; one wonders what he has in mind. John and Irina Mappin certainly give off the vibe of being very wealthy and connected people. I was also amused to note the locals in T-shirts and the Kazakhs in tuxedos!
Overall the video is wonderful in a sort of old fashioned way. Outside of Agatha Christie and P.G. Wodehouse, I’ve never heard anyone refer to anything as “the great hall”!
If you want to hire the hotel as well, this looks like the page to go to, but I couldn’t figure out what to do next. Incidentally, while the hotel is stunning I was surprised to note they had rooms for 39 pounds, and even the most expensive rooms are only 200 pounds. Cheaper than luxury hotels in Astana. So perhaps next year Nazarbayev will come to Camelot, if only to save some money!
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