On the latter, there’s a little more information out now. According to Azattyq (RFE/RL), around midnight on June 30th a van pulled up to two policemen in an official patrol car and shot them both dead in Subarshi village, Aktobe oblast. 6 suspects have been arrested. The consensus seems to be that police have been cracking down on alternative Muslim groups, which have been growing in popularity in West Kazakhstan. Officials refer to these groups as “Wahhabi”, a strict form of Islam often compared to Puritanism and the official Islamic sect of Saudi Arabia.

Because they do not go to the official mosques under the government Muslim board and use alternative texts, they have been targeted as an extremist sect by the government. Apparently followers feel they are subject to unfair government harassment. In 2009, Azamat Karimbaev, a leader of a small Muslim community, apparently was arrested and died in jail.

There are also rumors of a serious police crackdown since the shooting, including the detention of a new mother, police arresting people in the middle of the night, and a shoot-out in the woods between soldiers and civilians.

It’s unclear whether all this shooting in Aktobe is related to the other tragic and violent events or not. What does seem to be a trend is that people feel they have no way of being represented by official government bodies. Those who set themselves on fire were responding to what they felt was injustice or undue delay in criminal court cases. The bombings, which targeted the KNB, may have come from a similar feeling of lack of alternatives.

Often my friends from Kazakhstan seem to view democracy as a sort of naive ideal or a luxury that only rich nations can afford. It’s something that can be developed only when the more practical and necessary things are taken care of such as stability and food. While there may be some truth to the idea that you need economic stability to sustain a free society, democracy also fulfills a deeply practical need. If people feel that their government and their local officials are accountable to them, they are far less likely to engage in terrorism or violent protests. While I do not condone violence against police or bombings or self-immolation, I do suspect that these are the acts of people who feel that they had no other choice. More transparency in government and more accountability to the people would do much to allay these concerns.

By the way, the emergency call was responded to very quickly. I was home when the rain began, and left about 10 minutes later for an appointment near the park. The ambulance came by about 15 minutes after the beginning of the rain. That’s good response time!

Interestingly, the police also were very strict about letting film cameras anywhere near the site of the injury, harassing a cameraman on the other end of the footbridge. I can see why it might be upsetting to the family to see images of the injured or dead, but I’m not sure that it’s either illegal or that the police had to be so forceful about it.

Reports of party officials staying in nicer tents than the victims are sad, but not wholly unexpected. Reports that the temporary housing for villagers is not very nice also doesn’t particularly bother me. But claims that officials are delaying distributing aid are disturbing. Hopefully they aren’t planning to wait until the 6th of July!

Another interesting facet of this disaster is that suddenly Kazakhstan seems to have discovered solicitation of funds for disaster relief. For the first time, I have seen boxes at cash registers asking for aid for a particular disaster. Members of Parliament, province governments and ministries all made very public donations (after an act of government) and citizens are being urged to give. I even saw a truck with bullhorns on it announcing that NurOtan was taking donations. This includes donations for the people in East Kazakhstan who are victims of floods due to too much snow melting, not infrastructure fail.

I wonder why this solicitation is starting now. I don’t remember this much noise being made after the mining disasters in Temirtau or floods in East Kazakhstan last year or the sudden blizzard in South Kazakhstan that closed roads. Is Kazakhstan learning from Haiti disaster relief? Let’s hope this marks the start of public charitable giving.

According to Megapolis [RUS] (which has the most detailed account of the incident), the commanding Lieutenant assembled the battalion for the usual end of the day debriefing when he was summoned by his commanding officer. Serekbayev was left in charge of the platoon. Apparently, Serekbayev lined the platoon up and began examining them. When Orazbayev’s answer did not please him, he punched him in the rib cage, knocking him to the floor. He never regained consciousness. Two other soliders were also beaten although they did not die.

Serekvbayev, who has not denied his guilt, has been removed from duty and the investigation is ongoing.

It is further alleged [RUS] that the army notified the parents by saying “[Your son] died. Do you want us to send you the body or will you come to get it?” No apology, no introduction, no softening the blow. Just a bureaucratic problem to be solved.

This case is more disturbing taken in conjunction with the recent sentencing of another sergeant for beating recruits. This case, in which a young recruit also died of his injuries, is even more disturbing because it appears that the convicted had a criminal record before he joined the Army. He received 5 years of jail time, which some feel is highly disproportionate to his crimes.

I will note from personal experience that when I recently lectured about getting a job in the US, I mentioned in response to a question that military service tended to look good on a resume because it indicated the applicant had discipline and knew a number of job skills. The audience looked shocked before explaining to me that most people in Kazakhstan view soldiers as one step above criminals. Is that in fact the case? How do you feel about soldiers? Why is the army not better regulated?

One wonders what these people will do. I’m not an expert by any means, but I would think that physically watching the dam won’t give too much useful information. I’m sure the government is calling for technical monitoring as well. Are there any engineers in the audience? Does having observation towers help prevent dams from bursting?

Global Voices Online cites some good Russian language blogs with details of the evacuation, including a post from Lord Fame on LJ [RUS] who knows the area and posts pictures from the TV news.

The death toll is at 34 at the moment.

In understand that they are asking for donations of food and clothing. If anyone knows exactly how to donate, please comment. I’d be happy to send something and I’m sure other readers would as well.

Shortly after the disasters on Thursday and Friday, the President called for an investigation into the causes of the failures of the privately owned reservoir near Kyzyl-Agash and the public dam in the Karatalsky region of Almaty province. Already five people have been detained including the akim or mayor of the Kyzyl Agash village and the owner of the private dam. The President himself has noted in speeches in recent years that most of the infrastructure of Kazakhstan dates from Soviet times and needs repair or replacement. Whether these failures were preventable by timely repair or whether they were acts of God remains to be seen.

However, as people talk about Kazakhstan being a corrupt country, I wanted to note that if human error is to blame for this disaster, we need to look at corruption as a possible cause. I am not talking about this particular failure because I do not know the officials involved and I have no evidence to accuse them of being corrupt. But speaking in general, when officials use government money for their own gain, it means there is less money to go around. Or when they prioritize projects that involve companies belonging to relatives and friends, or companies that have paid bribes, other projects are deprioritized. Bribery is not a victimless crime. It is plausible that repair of infrastructure near some small villages was delayed or done shoddily because budget money for that repair was funneled elsewhere or the workers were hurrying since they also had to go fix some big man’s house.

Hopefully, the investigation will reveal that everything was aboveboard and this was simply a tragic act of God. But the next time we hear about a company bribing the government, think about which poor village might not get a new dam. Or sewage pipes. Or electricity.

Thursday, a dam was washed away in the Karatalsky region of Almaty province after heavy snowfall melted. 820 people are currently being sheltered in a nearby school. Friday another dam burst at the water reservoir in the Aksuisky region. Kyzyl-Agash, a village with 3000 people, was flooded. Many evacuated in time but not everybody. As of this moment, there is no official reporting of who the victims are.

On the other hand, in a story published a few hours later on Kazakhstan Today, The commission of Ministry of Health has revealed horrible infringements in the Republican blood centre, including some falsified documents. However the article does not go into great detail about the infringements.

Honestly there doesn’t seem to be a lot of information on this, possibly because the powers-that-be are trying to avoid another scandal like the HIV Crisis in South Kazakhstan where 100 people were infected with blood contaminated with the HIV virus. It was later found that hospitals in Skymkent were not testing blood, and were reusing needles and other hospital supplies because staff was selling supplies.

However the plot thickened quickly with rumors. Shortly after the tragedy, someone using the name Sabina Akhatova left a comment on the blog of the head of the Agency for Civil Service [RU], claiming that working conditions at the oblast akimat were inhumane, which drove Kasenzhanov to kill himself. She went on to accuse the current akim of a number of inhumane activities including forcing employees to work until 1am and inventing data on reports for the central government. She also claims that the head of the city theater died last week because he was called to see the akim despite the fact that he had the flu. The Moscow office of Respublika [RU] also received an anonymous letter with similar allegations. The akimat has responded by saying that no one named Sabina Akhatova works or ever worked in the administration and there is no such person registered in Ust-Kammengorsk. Of course, this may well be a screen name chosen to be plausible while still protecting the identity of the poster.

What is more, apparently Kasenzhanov’s wife showed up at the akimat and also claimed that her husband was forced to work long hours and that he was treated badly by his superiors which led him to feel hopeless.

Even the head of the city Department of Social Protection is asking why Kasenzhanov was working on a Saturday. He was quoted as saying that if the akim had not prepared a special order, which usually requires some justification, then forcing people to work on Saturday is a violation of the law.

The akim has ordered the local authorities to look into the death of Kasenzhanov, and the reasons for his suicide. At the moment unfortunately, all we have are unsupported allegations. I have no way of verifying or disproving any of the rumors posted on the web. Those of us who live in Astana and have friends who work in the central government are not shocked to hear about civil servants working until 1am or working on Saturdays, I suspect.

I would love to hear from readers who have some more definitive commentary on this situation.

Whether or not this suicide is a result of stress at work, Express-K [RU] reports that the head doctor of the local emergency hospital told them that suicide by young people is rather common in these times, presumably referring to Ust-Kammengorsk and East Kazakhstan. That alone is a disturbing trend and hopefully something good will come out of this tragedy if the authorities, civil society and our fellow man pay attention to the fact that many people feel hopeless enough to kill themselves.

The tunnel was 74 meters in length, and had tracks installed to haul the money out. It was apparently very well-dug so as not to interfere with underground cables. The thieves displaced 118 cubic meters of earth or 2000 tons, which was dumped in various landfills around the country. Police believe that one of the gang put a laser device in a safe-deposit box in Tsenabank which could then be tracked in order to guide the diggers.

So who says Kazakhstan is behind in innovative technology and the work ethic?