In this issue:
Emotion and Pride over the Pope among Kazakhs
Astana Akim Visits Ottawa to Share Experience
Kazakhstan's Medium-Term Economic Outlook Remains Robust
Mobile Telephone Use Skyrockets in Kazakhstan
Excuse me --- Kesheriniz
I don't understand --- Tsumbeimin
Emotion and Pride over the Pope among Kazakhs
Kazakhs reacted to the death of Pope John Paul II with "sorrow, emotion and pride" for the Pontiff had visited the largely Muslim nation in 2001.
"The sorrow felt by Kazakhs," said Fr Livio Lodigiani, a fidei donum priest in Astana, "comes from the fact that they saw in the Pope a common father. Their emotional reaction stems from seeing so many people going to St Peter's to say their last farewell to the Pope".
But there is also pride for the people of the Kazakh capital. "Kazakhs," again noted Father Lodigiani "are proud that someone as important as the Pope, who was admired by people of every religion, visited their country".
The Father explained that as soon as the news of the Pope's death was made public, Muslim students at the Eurasia University-where he teaches-came up to him to express their heartfelt condolences, always making sure to remember the Pontiff's 2001 visit".
A memorial mass was held for the Pope in Astana's Catholic Cathedral of Our Lady of Perpetual Help. Mgr Wesolowski Jòsef, the Apostolic Nuncio, celebrated the service.
A Book of Condolences was set up at the Nunciature and President Noursoultan Nazarbaïev was among the first to sign. He is sending an official delegation to Rome for the papal funeral.
On Friday, a giant screen inside the Cathedral will broadcast the funeral live with some local students providing simultaneous translation.
Astana Akim Visits Ottawa to Share Experience
Umirzak Shukeyev, Akim (Mayor) of Kazakhstan's new capital city of Astana, visited Canada this week to learn of its experience in building its capital in Ottawa and to tell about Astana's fast paced development.
Astana and Ottawa have a great deal of similarities. When it became Kazakhstan's capital, Astana "stole" the crown as the world's coldest capital from Ottawa.
Both cities are located on a parallel latitude and have long cold snowy winters and short summers. Both are cut in half by a river, the Ottawa River in Ottawa, and the Ishim River in Astana. Both face challenges natural for any capital city, - the need to provide state of the art facilities, transportation, utilities, and be a symbol of their country.
There's is one major difference,
however, and that is that Astana,
particularly its new center on the
left bank of the Ishim River which
dazzles and thrills visitors with its
ambitious layouts and landscapes
already put in place, have virtually
unrestrained and clean growth area.
While Ottawa celebrates its 150
years as a capital this year,
Astana is in its eighth year as
a capital.
In Ottawa, Akim Shukeyev met
Mayor Bob Chiarelli and Chairman
of the National Capital Commission
Marcel Beaudry. Akim Shukeyev led
a delegation of city officials involved
in city planning, architecture,
utilities, and greenery projects.
The meetings went in a very
productive way and
turned up a lot of useful leads and
discussions. Astana utilities and
greenery officials had extensive visits
to local facilities to get a first hand
experience of how these things are
done in Ottawa.
"We came here to look for an
example of what our city should be in 20 or 30 years time," Mayor Shukeyev said after the meetings in Ottawa. "We believe we found such an example in Ottawa."
The Akim explained the capital's population has increased more than twofold, from 220,000 in 1997, to 550,000 now. Every year, a number of projects are being built in the capital at such a fast pace that it requires enormous amount of careful planning and able management.
"In Ottawa'2020 we saw a plan we could borrow from," Akim said noting such particularities of the plan as an idea to build a green belt inside the city and have some smaller "city centers" on the outskirts of a major downtown.
"Our visit here was extremely useful and productive. We saw some genial ideas," the Mayor said.
His Canadian hosts were equally gracious and interested in Astana. Mayor Chiarelli, welcoming the Mayor to one of city council's meetings said: "We have learnt of remarkable progress that has been made in building a new country of Kazakhstan and its new capital. We believe we have something to learn from them too."
Mr. Beaudry, after viewing the presentation of Astana and its new 21-century landscape, called it "beautiful and staggering", as his colleagues compared what they saw to "futuristic and fantastic movie."
Kazakhstan's Medium-Term Economic Outlook Remains Robust
Kazakhstan's economy is expected to remain robust in the next three years, according to a major report released by the Asian Development Bank (ADB) April 6.
Following record gross domestic product (GDP) growth of 9.4 percent last year, Kazakhstan's economic growth is expected to remain strong, at around 8.0-8.5% per year in 2005-2007, says the Asian Development Outlook (ADO), the annual ADB flagship publication that forecasts
economic trends in the region.
The report says that the dynamic growth is expected in non-oil sectors owing to ongoing efforts on economic diversification and sustained high demand for Kazakhstan's commodities, mainly oil and metals.
The ADO projections are sensitive to such factors as "world oil prices, global demand, as well as the actual response to government policies and incentives in the non-oil sector," the report says.
In the medium term, the oil and gas sector will continue to be the principal engine of economic growth, with construction and manufacturing sectors adding a booster factor. The construction sector grew 11.2% in 2004 due to a rise in residential and infrastructure development projects in the new capital city.
Kazakhstan's fiscal position is expected to remain healthy, as rising oil revenues and improvement in tax administration offset tax cuts. While infrastructure development, Government's job creation schemes, and social welfare programs will expand the budget deficit from 0.3% of GDP in 2004, it will likely remain within a manageable level of around 1% of GDP in 2005-2007.
Despite the increases in public sector wages and expansion in the money supply, inflation is projected to be in the range of 5-6% per year in 2005-2007 (down from 6.9% in 2004). The national currency, tenge, will likely continue to appreciate due to expected buoyant export receipts and FDI inflows.
The external trade balance is forecast to remain in surplus in the medium-term, helping to keep the current account balance positive, ADO says.
The continued economic growth will help improve living standards. The Government's efforts to reduce the urban-rural gap and strengthen social safety nets for vulnerable population groups are expected to reduce the number of people living below the subsistence minimum to below 10% towards the end of 2007, down from 15% at the end of 2004. Employment creation in the private
sector and the success in ongoing efforts to diversify the economy will play a key role.
Mobile Telephone Use Skyrockets in Kazakhstan
One of Kazakhstan's mobile phone operators has announced with great fanfare the connection to its service of the 2-millionth customer on April 5, as tariffs are continually going down and the people of the country come to appreciate the benefits of mobile communication.
Alexander Znoev, a native of Zyryanovsk in East Kazakhstan, became 2-millionth customer of KCELL, receiving 2 million units of free communication, equal to 30 years worth of talk, or 160,000 SMS messages.
Users of K'CELL enjoy all the perks of third generation communications, including high speed transmission of information, Internet access and mobile office. Currently, K'CELL provides services for 360 cities and towns across the country and continues to expand.
K'CELL is one of three mobile phone operators. The other two are K-MOBILE and Dalakom. K'CELL and K-MOBILE brands use GSM standard, while Dalakom uses CDMA, an American technology.
Together, these companies are believe to service more than 3 million customers for a country of 15 million people.
Things to Watch:
- Kazakhstan's sportsmen will take part in the first ever World Islamic Games to take place in Saudi Arabia April 8-20, 2005. A total of 70 Kazakh athletes will compete in 14 sports, including field athletes, swimmers, karate and taekwondo fighters, as well as a time of water polo.
- People of Kazakhstan will celebrate the 60th anniversary of victory in World War II on May 9. More than 1.5 million people from Kazakhstan fought in the war, and more than 700,000 perished.
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News Bulletin of the Embassy of the Republic of Kazakhstan to the USA and Canada
(Compiled from own sources and agency reports)
Contact person: Roman Vassilenko
1401 16th Street NW, Washington DC 20036
Tel.: 202 232 5488, ext. 104, Fax: 202 232 5845
