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Kazakh President Arrives In Beijing Amid Anti-China Protests Back Home


Chinese Communist Party Politiburo member Yang Jiechi (left) shakes hands with Kazak President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev in Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, Beijing, on September 11.
Chinese Communist Party Politiburo member Yang Jiechi (left) shakes hands with Kazak President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev in Diaoyutai State Guesthouse, Beijing, on September 11.

Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev has arrived in Beijing for a two-day official visit amid anti-China protests at home.

Kazakhstan's presidential website said that Toqaev met with China's director of the Central Foreign Affairs Commission Office, Yang Jiechi, as part of his agenda on September 11.

Activists in Kazakhstan's restive southwestern town of Zhanaozen have held rallies against China's investments recently. Their protests were supported by activists in Nur-Sultan, the Kazakh capital; Almaty, the country's largest city; and several other towns and cities.

Anti-Chinese sentiment in Kazakhstan has been rising amid reports about the plight of indigenous ethnic groups, including Kazakhs, in China's northwestern region of Xinjiang.

The United Nations said last year that an estimated 1 million ethnic Uyghurs and other mostly Muslim Turkic-speaking indigenous people of Xinjiang were being held in what it described as "counterextremism centers" in the province, with millions more reportedly sent to internment camps.

Meanwhile, Kazakh officials are said to be moving ahead on a proposal to build 55 industrial facilities with Chinese financing, furthering fears of corruption, undue Chinese influence, and excessive reliance on Chinese investment in the former Soviet republic.

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