Kazakhstan making progress, ambassador says

By Stephen Jiwanmall
Collegian Reporter
April 2, 2009

With an undeniable smile on her face, Byrganym Aitimova said, “Look at me. I’m a [prime] example of [how women fare] in Kazakhstan.”

Aitimova, the permanent ambassador of Kazakhstan to the United Nations and the Minister of Education in several European nations, didn’t hesitate to describe the rising status of women in her country, as she spoke on the topic of “Women and Democracy in Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan” Tuesday afternoon.

The presentation was the second segment of a three-part series this week called “Crossroads of Empires: The Future of Central Asian Republics,” sponsored by the Diplomat in Residence Program, the Greater Philadelphia Asian Studies Consortium, and the university’s History Department.

First describing Kazakhstan’s status on the global scale, Aitimova explained that the country has been quite prominent in various fields for a nation which is younger than most students on campus.

Gaining independence in 1991, Kazakhstan has an abundant supply of mineral and natural resources, including uranium, natural gas and petroleum.

Exporting one million barrels of oil each day, Kazakhstan, a country four times the size of Texas, is projected to produce as much oil as Saudi Arabia by the year 2015.

One of the nation’s most stellar achievements has been its effort to promote education. More than 99 percent of its citizens are school-educated, according to Aitimova, and education has been an integral aspect of Kazakh life.

Aitimova was an instrumental part of creating Bolashak, an international scholarship program that allows the nation’s brightest students to study at some of the world’s top colleges and universities.

With the current global financial crisis, Aitimova said that Kazakhstan is one of only a few nations that is “still surviving” economically without significant obstacles. By reserving deposits from exporting oil, the country has saved $40 billion over the past six years and has used the money to support banking, agriculture, and technology, among other areas.

While the country continues to make progress in general, Kazakhstan prides itself on its improving treatment of women. The national constitution guarantees basic human rights and freedoms for all citizens, regardless of gender, religion, or any other factor.

National policy stresses four basic needs for improving female treatment: political promotion, improvement of health, elimination of violence, and wide economic involvement.

Women dominate the fields of education and healthcare, but are scarcely found in areas such as banking and governmental administration.

Unlike in other central Asian countries, women in Kazakhstan do not wear veils to cover their faces as an ethnic symbol of inferiority to men.

“We have never been far from men [status-wise],” Aitimova said.

Gulnar Kendirbai, a professor at Columbia University, added that women helped keep the Islamic faith alive when the Soviets occupied central Asia in the early 20th century.

Nomadic women from Turkmenistan ritually wore scarves over their mouths to hinder talk with other men and to discourage eating in front of them.

Though the Turkmens considered this practice as a symbol of modesty and chastity of their women, the Soviets sought to abolish the ritual. It was women who prevented the Soviets from doing so by arguing that the ritual was more ethnic than religious.

In Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and around the world, changing the status of women has become an international goal. Aitimova called her country “a model of harmony, freedom and democracy” for the world to follow.

jiwanmalls1@student.lasalle.edu