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According to media reports, police in Kazakhstan have killed numerous demonstrators who attempted to attack government buildings, as a Russia-led military alliance approved the deployment of a peacekeeping force to the Central Asian country to settle unrest sparked by rising fuel costs.
On Thursday, Kazakh police spokesperson Saltanet Azirbek told the Khabar-24 television channel that “extremist forces” attempted to storm administrative buildings and police offices in Almaty, the country’s largest city.
“Dozens of assailants have been killed, and their identities are being determined,” she said.
Despite the presence of dozens of troops and several armoured personnel vehicles, hundreds of protesters rallied in Almaty’s main plaza on Thursday, despite the presence of dozens of troops and armoured personnel carriers.
As the troops neared the masses, a Reuters journalist on the site reported hearing gunfire.
The new protests came a day after activists in Almaty set fire to the presidential palace and the mayor’s office. On Wednesday, crowds briefly overran the Almaty airport, forcing several flights to be cancelled.
At least eight police and national guard troops were killed in the unrest, according to the Kazakh Interior Ministry, with 300 others injured.
As tensions rose, President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev asked the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), a Moscow-based coalition of six former Soviet countries, for assistance late Wednesday.
On Thursday, CSTO Chairman and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that the alliance has agreed to send an undefined number of peacekeepers to Kazakhstan.
Pashinyan said the troops will be dispatched “for a short duration with the objective of stabilising and normalising the situation” in Kazakhstan in a statement on Facebook.
He also blamed the large protests on “intervention from the outside.”
On Thursday, state television claimed that Kazakhstan’s National Bank had chosen to cease bank operations for the protection of their employees, and that Middle Eastern carriers flydubai and Air Arabia had cancelled flights to Almaty.
The Kazakh president had already threatened to use harsh measures to suppress the unrest, declaring a two-week state of emergency for the entire country, extending one that had already been proclaimed for Nur-Sultan, the capital, and Almaty, the largest city.