Eurasian integration does not mean loss of sovereignty - Kazakh president

Eurasian integration does not mean the loss of sovereignty, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev said at the scholarship awarding ceremony in Almaty, Trend reports.

"Kazakhstan's participation in the Eurasian integration is our principal position," he said. "I think that we are moving in the right direction. The economic integration is the task of the whole world. Our developing economy requires new sales markets. So, we choose economic integration, rather than political. The issue of the country's political sovereignty is not being discussed."

One must not look for difficulties in the decision of passing from the Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet and consider it as some kind of evidence of Kazakhstan's geopolitical preferences, President Nazarbayev also said.

"Someone considered this as a kind of evidence of changing Kazakhstan's geopolitical preferences," Nazarbayev said during the ceremony of giving scholarship to literature and art figures in Almaty. "It is wrong. I will say unequivocally. Passing to the Latin alphabet is the internal need for the development and modernization of the Kazakh language. One must not look for difficulties, especially if there are no difficulties at all."

According to the President, passing to the Latin alphabet will have a huge impact on the cultural development of the country.

"This process must be well prepared," he added. "It is important to remember that huge volume of literary and scientific heritage in the Kazakh language, based on the Cyrillic graphics, was prepared in the twentieth century. It is also important that this public property has not been lost for Kazakhstan's posterity. We will establish a state commission to transfer the Kazakh language to the Latin alphabet."