Economic Relations between Kazakhstan and Russia

Ñòðàíèöà: 2/33

The emergence and further development of relations of equal partnership between new independent states, the Repub­lic of Kazakhstan and the Russian Federation, became a sort of synthesis of the entire centuries-old history of Kazakh-Russian relations. Only now can the relations between the two countries be justifiably described as subject-subject ones. At this stage, both states solved such problems as defining their status in the system of world politics, establishing relations with leading world nations, and entering the field of international law.

The dominant role of Kazakhstani problems has deter­mined the chronological framework of the investigation.

The overall time frame covers the period from December 1991 the setting up of the Commonwealth of Independent States, which finally marked the disintegration of the USSR to the end of 1995.

In the four years, bilateral Kazakhstani - Russian rela­tions went through a series of significant stages the study of which can adequately determine the level of mutual relations between the two countries, the scope and range of integration. We single out three stages in the development of Kazakhstani-Russian relations:

— Defining the legal interstate relations of the two coun­tries December 1991 - May 1920

— Searching for a model of economic and political coop­eration between the states May 1992 - March 1994

— Expanding and deepening integration between Kaza­khstan and Russia in the economic and other spheres March 1994 - 1995.

Although some elements of legal contractual relations between Kazakhstan and Russia may be discovered before De­cember 1991, when attempts to preserve the Soviet Union were made, it will be more chronologically correct, in our view, to choose the moment at which the CIS was legally formed and the activity of the Union structures of authority was discontinued as the starting point of the study.

We propose that the signing in May 1992 of the treaty of friendship, cooperation, and mutual assistance between the two countries be singled out as the concluding moment of the first stage in the relations between Kazakhstan and Russia and at the same time as the beginning of the new stage. That doc­ument became the foundation for qualitatively new relations in the history of the two states, opening the first page in the official interstate relations in the new history of Kazakhstan and Russia. It determined the principles of bilateral relations in the political, economic, military-strategic, cultural, and spir­itual spheres, lending a colossal impulse to the entire subse­quent negotiation process.

During the search for a model of interstate economic and political cooperation between Kazakhstan and Russia, the prin­ciples were developed for bilateral relations, which were later recorded in the treaty of friendship, cooperation, and mutual assistance. The first official visit of President Nazarbayev of Kaza­khstan to the Russian Federation in March 1994 marked the beginning of the third stage in the development of Kazakh­stani-Russian relations - that of expanding and deepening in­tegration between Kazakhstan and Russia.

This division of the time frame of bilateral Kazakhstani-Russian relations into periods shows that one of the goals of the present work is to demonstrate continuous development between Kazakhstan and Russia in the post-Soviet period.

As the period of political history analyzed here is ex­tremely close to the present, it cannot be regarded as worked out in detail in Russian and foreign scientific literature. How­ever, the problems of development of the new statehood of post-Soviet countries of Kazakhstan in this case, of the birth and evolution of interstate relations, of their entry into the international community, are being studied ever more actively.

The crucial period of the disintegration of the USSR and the emergence on the map of the world of new, independent states was primarily reflected in scientific periodicals. Special mention should be made of the collective work The New Treaty of Union: The Search for Solutions.

Problems of mutual relations between newly independent states have also become the subjects of attention of Russian experts and political scientists. The period of disintegration of the USSR and of the development of Kazakhstan as a sovereign independent state are at present actively studied by Kazakhstan scientists. Works have been written on the problem of the emergence of the new statehood, development of the system of separation of powers, democratization of society, evolution of party structures and institutions of democracy, and the construction of a new legal and judicial system. Present State and Works on the subject of bilateral Kazakhstani-Russian relations from the moment the two states achieved indepen­dence can be divided into several groups. The first and the most numerous one deal with relations between Kazakhstan and Russia within the framework of the Commonwealth of In­dependent States.

Ðåôåðàò îïóáëèêîâàí: 18/07/2008