Take three of this week’s Kazakhstan stories and line them up by date. On 10 June the country opened the US-led C5+1 critical minerals dialogue in Astana, courting Western capital and supply chains built to avoid China. The same day, a Kazakh delegation in Shenzhen collected up to 6 billion dollars in agreements for the Alatau project, deepening Chinese money in the economy. And the same day, the energy minister offered to carry more Russian gas to Uzbekistan, extending Moscow’s reach through Kazakh pipes.
This is multi-vector foreign policy, the doctrine Astana has preached for thirty years, shown as an ordinary day’s work. Kazakhstan sells minerals access to Washington, city-building and technology to Beijing, and transit to Moscow, and tries to keep all three patrons content at once.
Kazakhstan sells minerals to Washington, cities to Beijing and transit to Moscow, and tries to keep all three content.
The doctrine has served the country well, and Central Asia Wire does not fault a middle power for refusing to pick a camp. The strain is that the three vectors point in directions that are starting to cross. The C5+1 exists in good part to pull Central Asia’s minerals out of Chinese supply chains, at the very moment Chinese firms are exhibiting at the same Astana congress and funding Kazakhstan’s flagship city. Russian gas transit deepens a dependence Astana also says it wants to reduce. Each deal makes sense alone. Together they ask Kazakhstan to be three different partners in the same week.
The test is not the photo opportunities but what converts. Watch whether the C5+1 dialogue produces a signed mining investment, the thing the November frameworks have so far failed to deliver; how much of the Shenzhen 6 billion dollars turns from memorandum into capital; and whether Washington’s pressure starts to force choices Astana has so far avoided. Kazakhstan’s real skill has been declining to choose. The open question is how long the three vectors stay parallel before they meet.