DUSHANBE, October 15, 2015, Asia-Plus — Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev said on October 15 he and Russian leader Vladimir Putin were very concerned over the situation in Tajikistan.
Nazarbayev was speaking at a joint press conference with Putin after talks in the Kazakh capital, Astana.
“We are very concerned with the situation in Tajikistan,” President Nazarbayev said at the joint press conference after talks with Putin.
Tajikistan shares a border with Afghanistan, where there has been a flare-up in Taliban activity in the past few weeks, and there has also been internal strife inside Tajikistan, which the government blamed on Islamists,
Reuters
reports.
According to Russian media outlets, Nazarbayev also said “Kazakhstan has been, continues to be, and will remain the closest and most reliable neighbor and ally of Russia.”
Nazarbayev reportedly praised the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), which brought together Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, as well as Russia and Kazakhstan.
For his part, Vladimir Putin said bilateral ties with Kazakhstan were “a true allied relationship in every sense of the word.”
Putin further noted that said the two countries had “big plans” to drill for oil in the Caspian Sea.
