WASHINGTON -- Concern in Washington about political freedom in the energy-rich former Soviet Republic of Kazakhstan is growing, including among the new Democratic leadership of the Senate Foreign Relations Committee. World Politics Review has learned that Sen. Joe Biden last week sent a personal letter to Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev airing his frustration over the slowness with which the transformation toward "transparent democracy" is occurring in Kazakhstan, the second-largest of the former Soviet republics. Biden's office is refusing to release the letter to the press. However, in a telephone interview, the Delaware Democrat's chief of staff, Alan Hoffman, acknowledged the letter addressed the Kazakh government's apparent attempts to interfere with the efforts of new political parties to organize, particularly the pro-reform Atameken party. The party's young leader was in Washington recently complaining to journalists and U.S. policymakers about his country's "draconian law on political parties."
Kazakhstan Reform Party Gains Advocate in Sen. Biden
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