Kazakh President Praises Integration With Russia

Kazakh President Nazarbaev (left) with his Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, on April 4 (epa) April 5, 2006 – Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbaev today called relations between Kazakhstan and Russia a model of integration between former Soviet republics.

Addressing the lower house of the Russian parliament, the State Duma, that "Kazakhstan and Russia remain the locomotive of all integration processes in the post-Soviet area. There is a clear understanding between our two countries that only together can we respond to the challenges of our time: globalization, terrorism, extremism, drug trafficking."

Nazarbaev today wraps up a three-day visit to Russia. On April 4, he met with Russian President Vladimir Putin and pledged to more than double the capacity of a pipeline transporting crude oil from Kazakhstan to Russia.

(Interfax, ITAR-TASS)