Statement by H.E. Mr. Kassymzhomart Tokaev, Minister of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Kazakhstan at the 13th OSCE Ministerial Council (Ljubljana, December 6, 2005)

Mr. Chairman,
Dear colleagues,

It is my pleasure and privilege to express our sincere appreciation to the Slovenian Chairmanship and, particularly, to Minister Dimitrij Rupel. We also welcome the upcoming Belgian Chairmanship and wish Minister Karel De Gucht every success in his highly responsible mission.

30 years ago the Leaders of Europe signed a historic document – the Helsinki Act – thus expressing their hope and willingness to promote the rule of law, security for all, protection of human rights and cooperation in all areas of common interest. Now, we have another Europe, we have another composition and membership of our Organization. However, the fundamental tasks and issues that need to be implemented and solved remain as acute as ever if not to say even more pressing. Does it mean that the OSCE failed to implement its agenda? My answer is “no”, as the OSCE has proved itself as an outstanding and unique institution accountable to the international community that successfully deals with the problems and challenges constantly produced by this controversial world. Does it mean that the OSCE has to be changed, to be more effective and more understandable to the international community? My answer is “yes”. We still have to gain momentum in pursuing reforms in our Organization. The reforms are about strengthening the OSCE but not weakening our Organization.

Why reforming the OSCE should be recognized as a priority task? Because we have to admit that the OSCE nature has totally changed. Now it is no longer a purely European organization, but a Eurasian institution which needs to be properly managed. In 1992, the OSCE family has been enlarged as a result of inclusion of the newly independent Central Asian countries. The OSCE acquired new substance, new character and new dimension, at least, geographically.

My country, being strongly committed to close and active cooperation with the OSCE, is absolutely convinced that the Organization needs to perform its agenda and mandate in a more balanced way. The humanitarian dimension, protection of human rights, promotion of free media and advanced electoral standards are extremely important. And we will do our best to engrain these values in our country. It is our basic policy which has become irreversible. At the moment, we have already built a solid basis of civil society.

Meanwhile, in Central Asia there are a number of extremely serious challenges and threats that need to be brought into the agenda of the OSCE as priorities. We cannot ignore such problems like religious extremism, drug trafficking, illegal sales of weapons, trafficking in human beings. All these issues must be addressed in complex, since without solution of such substantial problems there will be no serious progress in tackling the issues of human rights and democratic development of the Central Asian states.

Right from the dust of its independence Kazakhstan has been strongly committed to cooperate with all countries within the OSCE to upgrade the efficiency and credibility of our Organization. From the very beginning we have been insisting on equal partnership and sincere dialogue. And we are grateful to all countries as well as the OSCE itself for supporting our country, in putting Kazakhstan on the right track of the development. To the large extent it is due to the international cooperation that my country has become an active regional player contributing a great deal to the security and cooperation in our part of the world. That’s the reason we propose to launch a dialogue between the OSCE and Conference on Interaction and Confidence Building Measures in Asia initiated and hosted by Kazakhstan. That, from our point of view, will be beneficial for both arrangements in terms of promoting and strengthening security in Eurasia.

Dear colleagues,

Two days ago Kazakhstan became a place of contested presidential elections. According to the assessments of the independent observers from a number of the countries, including those who are the OSCE participants, international organizations and institutions, these elections were free, transparent and honest. All the unbiased observers registered no serious violations of the law and confirmed the compliance of the elections to the international standards.

This is a result of our strong commitment to have cooperation with all international agencies, including the OSCE. The Government of my country accepted almost all the recommendations of the observers of ODIHR’s mission in the pre-elections period. We expressed our willingness to make these elections free and fair. And Kazakhstan managed to make them the best elections in our short history as an independent country. We appreciate the role of ODIHR in monitoring the presidential elections and its assessment of positive aspects of the campaign, particularly of substantial improvements in the administration of this election.

However, we disagree with some negative assessments that, in our view, resulted from the so called “technical approach” to the elections outcomes without taking into consideration the context and perspectives of the development of my country. Therefore, we took the preliminary report of ODIHR with certain concern. We do not over-dramatize the whole situation created by the negative part of the report, however, this document can not be deemed by us as neutral. Unfortunately, the report produced controversial feelings and doubts among our people about the credibility of ODIHR’s mission and its ability to meet the expectations of our society for the just and equal dialogue with the OSCE.

Despite all this, our people are determined to continue promoting liberal values either in the economy or in the political sector. Our people succeeded a lot in ensuring stability in the region. We appreciate the statement by the Presidency of the European Union on presidential elections in Kazakhstan. The government will positively respond to the recommendations made in this statement.

Meanwhile we have to remember that the people of my country almost unanimously voted for the President Nazarbayev’s policy of reforms which has already made Kazakhstan a success story in the post-soviet area. Our people voted for the stability, for the prosperous economy, for the better future of their children, for the strong, competitive and democratic Kazakhstan. They voted against upheavals, interethnic conflicts, unemployment and poverty. And this free choice of the multiethnic and multi-confessional people of my country should be respected in the world.

Kazakhstan as a responsible member of the civilized international community assumes and recognizes its obligation to follow the existing standards. I would like to underscore that Kazakhstan will continue the dialogue and cooperation with ODIHR. We will continue implementing the program of democratic transformation of our society, developing civil institutions, making our economy stronger and more competitive. Kazakhstan will enhance its role as an “anchor” of stability and prosperity in Central Asia. My country will remain a “sacred” territory of interethnic peace and inter-religious tolerance and harmony. Kazakhstan is willing to host the OSCE conference on tolerance.

And finally I wish to express our willingness to be further involved in the OSCE multi-dimensional activities on the vast territory of Eurasia. My country would consider as a great honor and supreme responsibility to contribute to the OSCE by performing the duties of Chairman-in-Office in 2009.

Thank you for your attention.