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UNCLAS SECTION 01 OF 03 ASTANA 001028 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE FOR SCA/CEN, SCA/PPD 
 
E.O. 12958: N/A 
TAGS: PGOV PHUM PREL ECON SOCI KDEM KPAO KMDR AF KZ
SUBJECT:  KAZAKHSTAN:  AMBASSADOR'S JUNE 11 PRESS CONFERENCE 
 
ASTANA 00001028  001.2 OF 003 
 
 
¶1.  SUMMARY:  The Ambassador gave a press conference on June 11, in 
which he highlighted President Obama's Cairo speech, reported on his 
participation in Kazakhstani Foreign Minister Marat Tazhin's visit 
to the United States, and answered journalists' questions on 
hot-button political topics.  This cable reports the more 
policy-intensive exchanges from the event, regarding President 
Obama's speech, the situation around Manas Airbase and rumors of a 
new U.S. base in Uzbekistan, Kazakhstan's proposal to host an 
international nuclear fuel bank, freedom of speech issues, and the 
recent corruption arrests.  Reporters also asked about why 
Kazakhstan is in the State Department's Bureau of South and Central 
Asia, and what the U.S. government is doing to free the imprisoned 
American reporters in North Korea.  END SUMMARY. 
 
UNDERLINING CAIRO 
¶2.  Q:  Since this press conference is focused on President Obama's 
Cairo speech, do you think the United States will draw on 
Kazakhstan's experience in dealing with intercultural issues? 
A:  President Obama's intention was to create a new atmosphere of 
understanding and cooperation.  Obviously the initiatives by the 
government of Kazakhstan in this area are very welcome.  President 
Nazarbayev made a very positive reply to the speech, and I am 
absolutely convinced that Kazakhstan not only has been but will be a 
very strong partner in this initiative. 
¶3.  Q:  Kazakhstan is an Islamic republic.  What do you want to say 
to all the Muslims in Kazakhstan? 
 
A:  I would say to the Muslim citizens of Kazakhstan that I hope 
that you had an opportunity to read the complete text of President 
Obama's speech because it showed a strong new understanding for the 
history and culture of the Islamic world.  I think that will become 
the basis for our policy with the Islamic world. 
¶4.  Q:  A new stage in the development of the United States' 
relations with the Islamic world began with the visit and speech of 
President Obama in Egypt.  Do you think that it was not a very 
successful beginning of this new stage, given numerous arrests of 
students in Egypt, including some students from Kazakhstan? 
A:  What President Obama did with his speech in Cairo was to 
dramatically change the tone of U.S. foreign policy in relation to 
Muslims and to Muslim governments all over the world.  You can't 
change the world and make it a perfect place with only one speech. 
Some of the problems that President Obama discussed have existed for 
over half a century:  for example, the problem of Israel and 
Palestine.  Unfortunately these kinds of things, the arrest of 
students, will probably continue to happen not only in Egypt but 
other incidents in other countries.  But the point is that I think 
the U.S. government and its diplomats will begin to look at these 
issues in different ways and try to solve these problems.  So it's a 
step by step process, but of course it's going to be a very long 
process. 
RUMOR CONTROL 
 
¶5.  Q:  Since you just came back from Washington, you might have 
fresh information on the latest developments on the placement of an 
American military base in Uzbekistan - if Kyrgyzstan does not change 
its mind, its decision, on closing the base. 
 
A:  From the beginning of this issue, our Secretary of Defense 
Robert Gates has said that we have other alternatives to the base in 
Kyrgyzstan.  We are continuing to study those other alternatives. 
But let me tell you that the question of a military base in 
Uzbekistan is not currently on the table.  The government of 
Uzbekistan has offered to use the airport at Navoy for the transport 
of non-lethal supplies to the American troops in Afghanistan.  These 
supplies arrive by air at Navoy and then are transferred to trucks 
for transportation into Afghanistan.  But that's not a military 
base.  The only other thing I would add on this issue, I know that 
the press speculates a lot about U.S. intentions for military bases 
in Central Asia, but that speculation is usually not correct. 
NUCLEAR FUEL BANK 
¶6.  Q:  I want to ask you about the bank of nuclear fuel.  There was 
information that there were negotiations between the governments of 
 
ASTANA 00001028  002.2 OF 003 
 
 
the United States and Kazakhstan.  Have any specific agreements been 
reached? 
A:  Good question, because it allows me to clarify this issue.  The 
government of Kazakhstan and the government of the United States are 
not negotiating this issue at all.  Why?  It's because the 
International Atomic Energy Agency controls the International 
Nuclear Fuel Bank Initiative.  So the government of Kazakhstan is 
working with the International Atomic Energy Agency to present its 
proposal and to negotiate the points in that issue.  However, 
Kazakhstan is a leader in non-proliferation in the world, and the 
government of the United States welcomes the proposal by Kazakhstan, 
and we will support this proposal in the future. 
FREEDOM OF SPEECH, VIRTUAL AND REAL 
¶7.  Q:  I'm sure you heard that a number of web sites are being 
blocked, Internet sites are being blocked in Kazakhstan.  The lower 
chamber of the parliament of Kazakhstan passed a new internet law 
and tomorrow the other chamber of parliament will pass it. 
Kazakhstan's civil society activists and journalists and 
international experts spoke against that new law as a law that will 
lead to further shrinking of freedom of speech in Kazakhstan.  How 
can you comment on that? 
A:  I saw the press reports that some activists had delivered to 
Parliament a computer mouse that was wrapped in chains, as if the 
mouse itself had been imprisoned.  I think the possibility of such 
civil action shows that there is a reasonable amount of freedom for 
speech and civil action in Kazakhstan.  Now for the law itself:  in 
principle, the United States firmly opposes any law that restricts 
access to the internet for political purposes.  We hope that the 
Senate, the upper chamber of parliament, will take a very close and 
serious look at this law before it takes any action on it. 
¶8.  Q:  In view of the meeting between [Foreign Minister] Marat 
Tazhin and Hillary Clinton in which they discussed Kazakhstan's 
upcoming chairmanship of the OSCE, what do you think of the 
repressive measures taken against mass media, such as the closing of 
"Taszhargan" newspaper and the arrest of the chief editor of "Almaty 
Info" newspaper for publishing KNB correspondence? 
A:  We are not shy to raise these issues with the government of 
Kazakhstan.  The government of Kazakhstan is very clear on our 
position about the treatment of mass media including individual 
newspapers and individual editors.  No country is perfect.  No 
country is absolutely black and white, including my own country.  We 
believe that the government of Kazakhstan will take its 
responsibilities for OSCE very seriously, and that there will 
continue to be incremental progress in all of these areas. 
HIGH PROFILE ARRESTS 
¶9.  Q:  What is your opinion on the frequent arrests, the numerous 
arrests of government officials, high-ranking government officials? 
 
A:  These questions are really the internal affair of the government 
of Kazakhstan.  So as a foreign diplomat I really have no right to 
interfere in these kinds of questions.  But I'll continue.  If in 
fact the arrests are part of a serious government campaign to reduce 
corruption in Kazakhstan then that's positive because it will 
benefit in the long term the people of Kazakhstan.  I can say that 
in principle the view of the United States is that all trials should 
be open and should be fair and should be transparent.  If people are 
convicted of real crimes, that's a matter for the courts.  But we do 
object to political motivations for such arrests and for such 
trials.  That's a general principle.  That is one of our ideals. 
And I do not mean to imply at this time that there are any political 
motivations. 
WHERE DO WE BELONG? 
¶10.  Q:  We can see a tendency for Kazakhstan to get closer to 
Russia within the framework of such organizations as the CIS, 
EurAsSec, and others.  At the same time the Department of State of 
the United States places Kazakhstan in the Bureau of South Asian 
countries.  Why is that? 
A:  First, let me say that I think regional organizations like the 
Shanghai Cooperation Organization, the Collective Security Treaty 
Organization, and EurAsSec can play an important role in regional 
relations and in global relations.  At the same time, I'm going to 
repeat what I have said before many times.  We, the United States, 
 
ASTANA 00001028  003.2 OF 003 
 
 
do not see a great game in this part of the world between Russia and 
the United States - or China - for influence and control of these 
independent countries.  Every country in Central Asia is independent 
and sovereign and makes its own decisions, and we see that every 
day.  When the State Department reorganized during the 
administration of President George W. Bush and placed the countries 
of Central Asia in the South Asia Bureau, that was much, much more 
simply a bureaucratic question than it was a question of ideology. 
Previously the countries of Central Asia and Kazakhstan had been 
part of the Bureau of Europe and Eurasia which was responsible for 
almost 50 countries and organizations.  At that same time the South 
Asia Bureau had only a handful of countries, five or six countries. 
Part of the thinking was that the countries of Central Asia could 
receive much more attention if they were in a bureau that showed a 
geographic entity that had fewer countries.  So in general it was a 
question of bureaucratic organization. 
AMERICAN JOURNALISTS IN NORTH KOREA 
¶11.  Q:  As we know, two journalists were detained in North Korea. 
What is the government of the United States doing, what actions is 
the government taking to release them? 
A:  For a country to sentence two young female reporters to prison, 
hard labor, for 12 years simply because they were not registered to 
report in that country is an international outrage.  Of course, our 
government has protested at the highest levels in very strong terms. 
 But in fact, the resolution of this kind of problem requires some 
degree of cooperation and goodwill from the other government.  We 
continue to hope that the government of North Korea will find a 
degree of cooperation and goodwill to release these young women.  I 
would also note that there was a parallel example recently, because 
Iran arrested an American-Iranian young woman, a journalist and put 
her on trial and sentenced her to prison.  We protested that arrest 
very strongly, and the appeals court in Iran overturned this 
decision and released this young female journalist so she could 
return to her family in California.  I think that's an example of 
goodwill and cooperation on the part of the government of Iran. 
HOAGLAND