Kazakhstan Bans Land Sales To Foreigners To Head Off Protests

NurSultan, Kazakhstan, (UrduPoint / Pakistan Point News - 13th May, 2021 ) :Kazakhstan has banned the sale of agricultural land to foreigners, the president's office said Thursday, in a bid to stave off opposition protests centred around Chinese investments.

The law banning the lease and sale of land to foreigners makes permanent a freeze imposed in 2016 after nationwide protests against controversial land code amendments rocked the authoritarian regime and stoked anti-China sentiment.

The rallies that spring had been sparked by authorities' proposal to amend the land code to extend leases on land for foreigners -- a move that they said would make projects more attractive to investors, but which deepened fears that Chinese buyers would purchase massive amounts of Kazakh farmland.

President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev signed the new law on Thursday as opposition groups readied for fresh protests against sales of land and investment projects from China this weekend.

Tokayev's advisor Erlan Karin wrote in a post on Telegram Thursday that the new law "ruled out all opportunities and loopholes for the acquisition and lease of agricultural land by foreigners".

The law meant that "speculation and manipulation of public opinion in this matter no longer have any grounds or prospects", Karin wrote.

Opposition activist Zhanbolat Mamay in a Facebook post called the new law a "victory" for the land protestors but said that his supporters should gather in the largest city Almaty on Saturday anyway.

"We will warn the authorities that we will never rent our land out to foreigners! We must protest against the construction (in Kazakhstan) of 56 Chinese factories!" Mamay wrote.

Kazakhstan's government welcomes investments from neighbouring China with the Kazakh foreign ministry billing the Central Asian country as the "buckle" in Beijing's trillion-dollar Belt and Road Initiative (BRI).