Russian troops arrived in Kazakhstan on Thursday to support the ruling power which is facing riots that have left dozens of dead, the situation remaining explosive with shots fired in Almaty, the economic capital.
The largest country in Central Asia is shaken by a protest that erupted in the West on Sunday after a rise in gas prices before reaching Almaty, where protests turned into a riot against power, protesters s’ taking over official buildings.
The violence continued Thursday. An AFP correspondent heard several gunshots in the center of the city, which bore the scars of the previous day’s clashes, with building facades blackened by flames, charred vehicle carcasses and puddles of blood on the ground.
Local media said Thursday evening that the police had driven protesters from the main square in Almaty and regained control of official buildings, which AFP could not verify.
Shortly before, Moscow had announced the arrival in Kazakhstan of Russian soldiers as part of the deployment of a “collective peacekeeping force” of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a group under Russian control, at the call of the Kazakh government.
On Thursday, the United States warned Russian troops against any human rights violations or attempts to “take control” of the country’s institutions. “The United States, and frankly the world, is watching for any possible human rights violations. And we are also monitoring any act that could lay the groundwork for a takeover of Kazakhstan’s institutions, ”said US diplomacy spokesman Ned Price.
“We hope that the government of Kazakhstan will be able to respond to the problems which are fundamentally of an economic and political nature,” he added.
” Creepy “
The violence shocked Kazakhstan, a country of about 19 million people, rich in natural resources and renowned for its stable and authoritarian government.
Willow, a 58-year-old protester, said she saw a dozen protesters fall under the bullets of the police near the presidential residence in Almaty on Wednesday evening.
Demonstrator against “corruption”, she also says she is “deeply disappointed” by the Kazakh President, Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, who accused groups of “terrorists” formed, according to him, abroad of being behind the riots. .
The toll of these disturbances is heavy: the authorities have reported “dozens” of demonstrators killed and more than a thousand people injured, 62 of them seriously. Eighteen members of the security forces were killed and 748 injured, news agencies reported, citing the authorities. The latter, which established a state of emergency and a night curfew, announced Thursday that around 2,300 people had been arrested in Almaty alone.
Mr Tokayev has so far failed to calm protesters, despite concessions on gas and fuel prices, and the sacking of the government.