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LONDON (TCA) This week in the Wall Street Journal, President Nursultan Nazarbayev of Kazakhstan commented on the next chapter of Kazakh-EU relations. Already, half of Kazakhstans trade with the world goes into the European Union mostly facilitated by its status as the third largest non-OPEC oil producer in the world. Yet in the midst of Eurozone crisis, economic recession and EU instability is Kazakhstan making the right choice? The answer is yes. The whole of Central Asia is slowly been subjected to the modern equivalent of The Great Game which saw the British and Russian Empires pitted against each other for supremacy over Central Asia in the Nineteenth and early Twentieth Century. Today Moscow and Beijing both have their eyes on the same target and Kazakhstan must turn to the West.

For a post communist nation, the European Union represents a vast trading opportunity that would propel Kazakh economic influence to the forefront of the oil trading world. This year we saw how the effects of sanctions on Russia damaged Kazakhstan greatly and may have finally taught Astana that absolute economic dependency on Moscow was a long term danger. To the east, Kazakhstan has signed contracts with China worth some $30 billion and growing. If Chinese influence starts to grow in the region, it is likely Moscow could become more aggressive leaving Kazakhstan stuck in the middle of the feud. The EU can offer much more.

If Kazakhstan can escape the Russian economic stranglehold over its resources and manage to sign a successful Partnership Cooperation Agreement with Brussels, the effects of Sino-Russian competition in the future could shield the country. In economic terms, the EU can offer Kazakhstan an escape route away from the damaging shockwaves of Moscows foreign policy. Negotiations to join the World Trade Organisation are going well for Astana that will allow Kazakhstans resources to be exported out of the Kremlins Cold War-esque sphere of influence.

Kazakhstans developing closeness with the European Union opens up another door. As the Islamic State of Iraq and Levant (ISIL) ravages land beyond the Caspian Sea and actively recruits from Central Asia, security is becoming ever the more important. If ISIL could wield influence in Kazakhstan they would link up with the Eastern Chinese region of Xinjiang and the Uyghur militant groups who are already fighting in Iraq for the Islamic State. Yet what are the chances of Russia and China assisting Kazakhstan and the rest of the region if Islamic State militants bring war to the region? An active Russian and Chinese presence would bolster, enhance and solidify their exploitive influence in the region that would further place Kazakhstan at the centre of a diplomatic and economic struggle between Moscow and Beijing. To counter this, the continuation of the tested multi vector policy of various Central Asian countries with a well vested and serious relationship with the EU could draw out the intensity and virility of any Sino-Russian confrontation in the region.

For further information:

The Times of Central Asia

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The European Union best trading partner for Kazakhstan