Kazakh Gov't Quits As Protests vs Gas Price Hike Rage

Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev accepted the government's resignation on Wednesday, Jan. 5, 2022, after a fuel price increase in the oil-producing Central Asian country triggered protests in which nearly 100 police were injured, Reuters and CNN reported.

Photo Insert: House of Parliament, Kazakhstan

Police used tear gas and stun grenades late on Tuesday to drive hundreds of protesters out of the main square in Almaty, the former Soviet republic's biggest city. Clashes resumed on Wednesday after the Cabinet resigned.

A Reuters correspondent saw thousands of protesters pressing ahead towards Almaty city center, some of them on a large truck, after security forces failed to disperse them with tear gas and flashbang grenades. Atameken, Kazakhstan's business lobby group, said its members were reporting cases of attacks on banks, stores, and restaurants.

Kazakhstan is a tightly controlled country that cultivates an image of political stability, helping it attract hundreds of billions of dollars of foreign investment in its oil and metals industries over three decades of independence.

City authorities urged residents to stay home, saying that the law enforcement operation was continuing.

The protests began after the government lifted price controls on liquefied petroleum gas at the start of the year. Many Kazakhs have converted their cars to run on LPG because of its low cost.

Speaking to acting cabinet members, Tokayev ordered them and provincial governors to reinstate price controls on LPG, and broaden them to gasoline, diesel, and other "socially important" consumer goods.

He also ordered the government to develop a personal bankruptcy law and consider freezing utilities' prices and subsidizing rent payments for poor families.

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