DUSHANBE, December 16, 2013, Asia-Plus — On Monday December 16, Tajik President Emomali Rahmon congratulated his Kazakh counterpart Nursultan Nazarbayev on the occasion of Kazakhstan’s Independence Day, according to the Tajik president’s official website.
In his cable of congratulations, Rahmon, in particular, notes with satisfaction that bilateral cooperation between Tajikistan and Kazakhstan, which is based on traditions of friendship and mutual respect, is steadily expanding.
“I would like to stress an especial value and usefulness of our mutual efforts to strengthen many-sided cooperation for the benefit of the two fraternal peoples and the region as a whole,” Tajik leader noted.
In the waning days of Soviet rule, individual republics of the Soviet Union sought greater autonomy. The Soviet Union agreed in early 1990 to give up its monopoly of political power. Following the lead of Lithuanian SSR, Russian SFSR and others, Kazakh SSR declared its sovereignty on October 25, 1990, and Kazakhstan subsequently became independent on December 16, 1991 as the Soviet Union collapsed. December 16 is now commemorated as Kazakhstan’s Independence Day, while October 25, the anniversary of the adoption of the “Declaration on State Sovereignty of Kazakh SSR” by the Kazakh legislature in 1990, is commemorated as Republic Day.
Kazakhstan is the world”s largest landlocked country by land area and the ninth largest country in the world. Kazakhstan’s major exports include oil products, wheat, textiles, and livestock.
