Kazakhstan not to open borders with Kyrgyzstan. Road map not signed

Minister of Economy of the Kyrgyz Republic Artem Novikov commented the day before on the speech of the Prime Minister of Kazakhstan Bakytzhan Sagintayev.

«There were voiced the facts that Kyrgyzstan smuggles goods to Kazakhstan. The problem of unaccounted imports exists not only in the Kyrgyz Republic, but in all countries of the Eurasian Economic Union. It is unambiguous to say that the problem is only in Kyrgyzstan, it is not entirely correct statement of question,» the Minister of Economy of Kyrgyzstan said.

The situation is exactly the same in Kazakhstan. For example, China shows the volume of exports to Kazakhstan at the end of 2015 at $ 8.5 billion, while Kazakhstan showed imports of about $ 5 billion.

Artem Novikov

The head of the Ministry of Economy added that the Kyrgyz side will analyze in detail all the points set by Sagintayev and will make a separate statement.

«This emotional statement does not help the solution of the problem on the border. In fact, control at the border is restored indirectly. In this context, the government delegation spent five days in Astana to resolve the situation. A roadmap was prepared. The points were agreed, we chose a constructive approach, even though the map largely shaped Kyrgyzstan’s commitments,» Artem Novikov said.

But today Kazakhstan has informed us that even with the signing of the road map, the borders will not be opened, there will be no free movement. Therefore, the signing of the document did not take place today. We will build further actions taking into account the mechanisms that exist within the framework of EEU.

Artem Novikov

Recall, Kazakhstan has strengthened control on the sections of the Kazakh-Kyrgyz and Kazakh-Russian border since October 10. There are queues of heavy trucks moving to Kyrgyzstan at the checkpoints.