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This year marks the 20th anniversary of the Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Aid (May 25th, 1992) between Russia and Kazakhstan. Today the international treaty framework of Kazakh-Russian cooperation has more than 480 treaties and agreements in various spheres. On June 7-8, 2012, during the visit of the Russian president Putin to Kazakhstan heads of the states discussed a wide range of issues of Kazakh-Russian cooperation, including the nuclear power, exploration of space, and staying of Kazakh citizens in Russia and Russian citizens in Kazakhstan. Moreover, presidents signed the Protocol on amendments to the Treaty on Friendship, Cooperation and Mutual Aid, which requires prolongation of the treaty and changes some of its articles.
According to the Russian expert, the editor-in-chief of Vestnik Kavkaza, Alexei Vlasov, the main vector of the current development of the cooperation is social modernization of two countries. “I can say that relations are developing successfully in both directions; any problem can be solved at the bilateral level,” Vlasov said.
He thinks today prospects of building intergovernmental cooperation have already been defined. “I believe today problems of social modernization are very acute for Russia and Kazakhstan. Contact points in this sphere cam improve stability of development of both Russia and Kazakhstan. And of course, he should mention personal contribution of both presidents to improvement of these contacts,” Vlasov stated. The expert emphasized that relations between Russia and Kazakhstan can be characterized as “the strategic union” which develops in the bilateral format and within the Eurasian integration project.
New outlines of bilateral cooperation between Russia and Kazakhstan were marked in the recent Pavlodar forum. “The wider format concerns cooperation of the countries within the Customs Union, the Unified Economic Space. I think any visit by Putin to Kazakhstan or Nazarbayev to Moscow should be considered in the context of two levels of cooperation: bilateral and multisided,” Vlasov thinks. At the same time, the most significant aspect of bilateral cooperation is trade and economic ties. Russia is the major trade partner of the republic. The trade turnover between two countries was $23.9 billion in 2011.
Attention is paid to development of cooperation in the sphere of electricity power, which is provided according to the Mutual Actions Plan of Kazakhstan and Russia. It requires establishing the unified market of electricity energy. Today the question on establishing of FS for providing functions of the operator of electricity deals. Kazakh-Russian cooperation in the sphere of nuclear power industry is developing dynamically. Joint projects on further development of transport and transit potential are being realized. The Plan contains 29 items touching upon various spheres of the relations. For example, politics, economy, space, transport, inter-regional cooperation, migration, and prevention of emergency situations.
