Kazakhstan Offers to Hold Joint Military Exercises With Turkey

By: Roman Muzalevsky

On January 20, the Turkish Ambassador to Kazakhstan, Atilla Gunay, met the Kazakh Defense Minister Adilbek Zhaksybekov in Astana as part of a series of recent meetings to foster bilateral dialogue. Centered on military cooperation, it came three months after Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev visited Ankara to sign a strategic partnership agreement that emphasized closer military collaboration between the two countries. The meeting culminated in an offer to Turkey to hold joint military exercises for the first time as a new feature of their bilateral military cooperation. According to Zhaksybekov, Nazarbayev’s visit to Turkey provided an impetus for enhanced relations between the two states (Turkish Weekly, January 21). “We previously had such an agreement, but this time we have expanded and formalized it. It is aimed at the future,” Nazarbayev stated following the negotiations with the Turkish President Abdullah Gul in October, 2009..................The Jamestown Foundation

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