Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan open their borders

President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev, who is on a working visit to Kyrgyzstan, and the President of this country Almazbek Atambayev today participated in a ceremony to mark the cancellation of customs controls at Kyrgyz-Kazakh state border. The two leaders, who were at that time on the coast of the alpine lake Issyk-Kul, gave a command to open the borders in direct teleconference mode.

According to Nazarbayev, the current event will have a positive impact on bilateral economic relations, help revitalize trade and improve the welfare of citizens of Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan, as well as open new opportunities for business. "The opening of the customs border between the two countries will revitalize business and trade. At the moment, there is a crisis, we have it, and the world has it, which also affects us. We know that. In the long term, this alliance will lead to an improvement of the welfare of our peoples," RIA Novosti quoted him as saying.

"Full-scale integration into the EAEU opens up new opportunities for economic growth in Kyrgyzstan," President of Kyrgyzstan Almazbek Atambayev stated.

In an interview with a correspondent of Vestnik Kavkaza, the Editor-in-chief of the magazine 'World of Eurasia', Eduard Poletaev, expressed the view that the opening of the Kazakh-Kyrgyz border, will first of all make life easier for ordinary citizens, hundreds of thousands of whom move between the two countries for employment, with the aim of transit and tourism. "One of the tasks of creating the Eurasian Economic Union is to simplify life for ordinary citizens, so of course this is a very big plus," he said.

"In my opinion, right now Kyrgyzstan needs a certain stage of stability and understanding. The stage of presenting itself as a country that has joined a new economic union, which is positioning itself in the future as quite successful. The country must demonstrate how it will be able to comply with other countries of union, as one of the components of the EAEU, its members," Eduard Poletaev concluded.

As the Deputy Director General of the North-South Political Studies Center, Yulia Yakusheva noted, the question of what Kyrgyzstan itself will give to EAEU and Kazakhstan in particular is debatable, and of course it is discussed by all the experts. "First of all, we are talking about potential, about the benefits that can be obtained in the future. I have already said that there are opportunities for a new boost to the development of the Kyrgyz economy, light industry above all. These are, of course, products that may be in demand in the Eurasian market," the expert believes.