Atambayev: Kyrgyzstan doesn't need adoption of Latin alphabet

The gradual adoption of the Latin alphabet does not unite, but rather alienates our peoples of Altai, Kyrgyz President Almazbek Atambayev said at the 'Altai Civilization and Related Peoples of Altaic Language Family' forum in Bishkek.

"The 'divide and conquer' Pan-Turkism idea was used against our peoples both in the Russian Empire and in the USSR. Unfortunately, often scientists were used for this. Let's speak about classification of Turkic peoples by groups. Altai, Kyrgyz, Kazakh, Karakalpak, Tatar and Bashkir are in one of them. Uzbek and Uyghur are in the Karluk group. But, there is also a separate group — Kyrgyz group, which includes Khakassians and Shorians, but there are no Kyrgyz. Although all these people, of course, should be in the same group, because their representatives can communicate with each other freely in their native languages without interpreters," AKIpress cited the President as saying.