Kazakh soldiers first called on the demonstrators to leave the Republic Square, threatening to shoot. Soon after, they actually opened fire. The TASS agency wrote that, according to eyewitnesses, the shooting claimed the dead. “People who ran from the square confirmed that there were wounded and killed people on the scene,” TASS wrote. AFP and Reuters reporters at the time said the shooting was being heard in the center of Kazakhstan’s largest city.
According to Interfax, witnesses said the soldiers arrived in five trucks in the square, where about 300 protesters were staying at the time. The action of Kazakh soldiers was preceded by calls to evacuate the city’s main square. “Everybody leaves the square, we start firing,” the media said from the trumpeters. According to Interfax, the authorities have not yet confirmed reports of the shooting in the square. Instead, they reported on the “destruction of terrorists” who attacked police headquarters.
A police spokesman in Almaty has previously announced the “liquidation” of dozens of attackers on government buildings, which some media interpret as confirmation that security forces have already killed dozens of demonstrators.
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In the afternoon, the Kazakh Ministry of the Interior increased the data on dead and wounded members of the security forces. According to the statement, 18 police officers have lost their lives so far and 748 have suffered injuries. However, the numbers of victims among the protesters are still not mentioned by the authorities. The Ministry of Health alone said earlier that the riots had claimed more than a thousand people in the country.
The Ministry of the Interior also increased the number of detained protesters from the previous 2000 to 2298.
The shooting on the main square in Almaty was described by the Russian newspaper Kommersant as a sign that the authorities have started to “clean up” the city, in which, according to the newspaper’s correspondent, the apocalyptic situation prevailed today: “On the way to the city . Dozens of cars, clouds of people. “
Closer to the center, people reportedly opened the fuel tanks themselves and poured it into canisters. “It is in thick smoke, mixed with smog, and there are the remains of burnt buses, trucks and cars. The closer to the center, the more burned stops and destroyed ATMs. The shops are barricaded or looted, “the correspondent of the Russian daily described. According to him, many cars with unscrewed license plates drive chaotically around the city. “We feel that nothing in the city is under control and no rules apply,” Kommersant added.
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An operation of mainly Russian soldiers under the auspices of the ODKB is now starting in Kazakhstan. Member countries have promised to send “peacekeepers” to Kazakhstan for a limited time. The first Russian paratroopers are already on the scene, their main task, according to the ODKB secretariat, is to protect important state and military facilities and assist the Kazakh forces in “establishing order”. RIA Novosti also wrote, referring to the secretariat, that this “peacekeeping mission” should last “several days or weeks” and will involve around 2,500 troops.
Kazakhstan, the largest and richest Central Asian country, has been experiencing the worst anti-government protests in at least a decade since Sunday.
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