Dozens of protesters were killed by police in Kazakhstan overnight, while violent protests continued across the country. This was announced by the Kazakh police themselves. “Last night, extremist forces attempted to storm the administrative buildings and the police department in Almaty, as well as local police departments and posts,” said a police spokesman, quoted by Interfax-Kazakhstan, Tass et Ria Novosti.
A video released by the Tass agency and circulating on the media and on social networks shows soldiers in war gear in Kazakhstan while firing rifles at eye level, presumably at the demonstrators, who however are not visible in the frame. they hear shots. The country had asked for help from Moscow, obtaining the dispatch of troops from Russia and the allies.
The police: it is an anti-terrorism operation
“Dozens of assailants have been eliminated and their identities are being investigated,” said the spokesman for the police of the former Soviet Central Asian republic, Saltanat Azirbek, who called their killing a “counter-terrorism operation”, saying that the shooting was still ongoing in the country’s economic capital, Almaty. According to the Kazakh Ministry of the Interior, quoted by local media, at least 8 members of the police were killed in the clashes and another 137 injured.
Images disseminated on local media and social networks show looted shops and some administrative buildings stormed and set on fire. Late yesterday the Organization of the Collective Security Treaty (CSTO), which brings together Russia and five other former Soviet republics, at the request of Kazakhstan, announced the dispatch of a “peacekeeping force” to “stabilize the country” perturbed by “external interference”. The protest was triggered by the announcement of the increase in gas prices.
First troops sent from Moscow and allies
Meanwhile, the first troops of the “peacekeeping force” promised in the evening by the CSTO alliance, which brings together Russia, Kazakhstan, Armenia, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan and Tajikistan, have been sent to Kazakh territory, crossed by violent street riots, according to Moscow. “A collective peacekeeping force of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) has been sent to Kazakhstan for a limited period to stabilize and normalize the situation,” the alliance said in a statement released by the spokesman for the Russian Foreign Ministry. , Maria Zakharova