Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev has announced that he will now lead the national security council, which was previously led by former head of state Nursultan Nazarbayev.
“As the head of state and, from this day, as chairman of the Security Council I intend to take maximally tough action,” Tokayev said in a statement broadcast on the state television channel Khabar 24 on Wednesday.
Rallies against a sharp rise in liquefied gas prices first started in Zhanaozen, a city in the Mangistau region in western Kazakhstan, on January 2, then escalating into mass protests with economic and political demands across the country. Clashes between protesters and the police occurred in Almaty on January 4.
Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev signed a decree early on Wednesday morning, introducing a state of emergency and a curfew, from 11:00 p.m. to 7:00 a.m., in Almaty and the Mangistau and Almaty region until January 19.
The Kazakh government resigned in the early hours of Wednesday as well.
