Victor Yanukovich with Nursultan Nazerbayev

[Gotno Gizmo]

I was ammused to see the Presidents of Ukraine and Kazakhstan sat together with Dimitry Medvedev at the US hosted nuclear security summiit on today's TV news. I was wondering if Victor Yanukovich was aware of Nazerbayev's recent TV interview on the "France 24" TV channel. The Kazakhstan president was being asked about the lack of human rights in his country. In particular the inability for the development of any political opposition party that might threaten his long lasting presidency. Nezarbayev replied that the greatest need of Kazakhstan was industrial growth and development of its economy. He continued that for sucess in a post Soviet space space democracy cannot be a priority, and cited Ukraine as an example of a post Soviet space where democracy had caused it to go wrong. I think that there are many Ukrainians who might share the same view. However, Victor Yanukovich will know that he could never have been allowed to be a candidate in opposition to the existing Presidency in a country like Kazakhstan. He would have either suffered an "unfortunate accident", or been thrown into prison on a trumped up charge.
Nezarbayev's dictatorship is politely overlooked with all the major powers for the simple reason that they are all negotiating oil and gas supply deals with him.
My earlier comments in the the thread about the ousted Kyrgyz President Kurmanbek Bakiyev are very relevent to this topic.