President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Zhomart Tokayev announced, speaking at a meeting of the lower house of parliament on January 11, that he was introducing a moratorium on raising the salaries of members of the government and deputies, since "their salaries are quite sufficient.

"I believe that the salaries of the above categories of civil servants are quite sufficient, so I consider it possible to declare a five-year moratorium on increasing the salaries of government members, akims (heads) of regions and deputies," he said in particular.

Tokayev also announced the end of the "acute phase of the counter-terrorist operation" and that the withdrawal of CSTO troops from the country would take about ten days.

The President instructed a special investigation team to find out "why the state slept through the presence of sleeping cells of militants and the activities of their command post."

The protests in Kazakhstan began on January 2, when residents of the western cities of Aktau and Zhanaozen protested against higher prices for liquefied gas. In the following days, riots broke out in other cities, including Almaty. According to the authorities, 17 security officials were killed during the protests, the number of victims was 1.3 thousand.

On January 5, Tokayev dismissed the government, and also personally headed the Security Council of Kazakhstan. He announced a terrorist threat to the state and turned to the CSTO for help, after which collective forces of peacekeepers from Russia, Belarus, Armenia and Kyrgyzstan were sent to the country.

bbabo.Net