In a Darkened World, is the Sun Rising Over Central Asia?

http://www.newdawnmagazine.com/articles/in-a-darkened-world-is-the-sun-rising-over-central-asia

March 2, 2012 By davidjones

President Nursultan Nazarbayev

By VICTORIA LEPAGE

In the light of the political upheavals and mass rebellions taking place almost everywhere in the world – in the north African and Near Eastern Muslim states, in Afghanistan and Pakistan, in Europe and America – all the international talk at present is on the clash of global geopolitical forces and how to resolve them. Can we ever expect world peace to materialise out of what amounts to a worldwide battlefield?

Some observers believe not. They contend that … the resolution of the present state of chronic international conflict can come about only from above, from the cultural/religious sphere. Commenting on the great natural catastrophes of 2011, as well as the escalating rebel activities in north Africa, Wilhelm Augustat, Austrian president of the European office of the Peace Through Spiritual Culture Association International, said: “It has once again become obvious that solutions for problems of this size and type cannot be derived from the technical and sociopolitical levels of our civilisation, by excluding the spiritual-cultural sphere of human life.”1

Those who hold to Augustat’s view and see the building of a peaceful worldwide commonwealth of nations as a possibility that must begin at the highest cultural and spiritual level, are turning their attention to Kazakhstan in Central Asia, whose new capital, Astana, hosted the above-mentioned World Forum of Peace through Spiritual Culture in October, 2010. In Kazakhstan they glimpse something immensely hopeful for the rest of the world taking place: the rebirth of principles of civilisation once considered essential for peace and mutual understanding between nations, but now long lost to the world, their very existence forgotten.

…

Tiberio Graziahni, president of the Institute of Advanced Studies in Geopolitics and Auxiliary Sciences, refers to the region that traverses central Asia from the Gobi to the Mediterranean basin as “the hinge of the whole Afro-Eurasian landmass” and as critical to its integration – and to world peace. Widely regarded as the crucible of civilisation, Central Asia is even more than that: … history reveals that the influence of a single powerful spiritual source has been radiating out under various names, promoting peace and righteousness to the ends of the Earth for countless millennia.

From the Karakorum mountains at the western end of the Trans-Himalayas this same spiritual hierarchy gave birth to the Sun religion around five thousand years ago. It sent forth the Sons of the Sun or Sons of Heaven, sometimes known as the Sons of Light, to build a network of temples around the globe that brought knowledge both scientific and spiritual to the people and civilisation to the whole planet. Supplanting Ice age shamanism and the earlier worship of the Pole star in the constellation Draco for that of the Sun, the new faith nevertheless preserved a great deal of reverence for the lofty principles of its predecessor, as indeed is testified by the totemic masks of birds, animals and fish still worn by the neter gods in ancient Egyptian art. This mysterious hierarchy also lay behind the Sun religion of the Shang dynasty in China and the Kibieri of the Celts, and behind the Solar religion of the Egyptian kings of Heliopolis who, as Sons of the Sun, were closely allied to the original Asiatic order.

Although still culturally devastated by the destructive materialism imposed on them by communist Russia, Kazakhstan’s people preserve

the memory of their illustrious past and long for its return. Travellers say that the whole of Central Asia still rings with stories of

Shambhala, a place of enlightenment and peace hidden among the most remote mountain valleys, and once known also as the Land of the Living Gods, the Forbidden Land and the Land of White Waters where the culture-bearing Sons of the Sun originated. Faced by the devastation of their ancient culture, the hopes of many of the Central Asian peoples are still high that soon this will be rectified;

the king of Shambhala will lead his great band of warriors out to destroy his enemies and reclaim the kingdom as his own, as a Buddhist prophecy has long declared.

Legend foretold the day when Rigden Jyepo, the king of Shambhala, would come with a great army to destroy the forces of

evil and usher in a golden age: the Age of Maitreya. Shambhala,

therefore, symbolised the great future, when the Panchen Lama would be reborn as Rigden Jyepo and the reign of Maitreya, the Coming One, would begin.2

Provocatively, however, the former Library Congress historian and Professor Andrei Znamensky has a somewhat different and less spiritual take on the prophesied Buddhist war of Shambhala. Obviously, he says in his book Red Shambhala, the prophesy is actually directed against Islam and the mlecca – the Mecca people – who have

invaded the land.3 However that may be, today there are signs in Kazakhstan of the birth of a Muslim reforming programme that owes nothing to the more combative Buddhist

scenario, yet fulfils in every essential way the Shambhala prophecy, promising to usher in a new era and a new sacred society based on culturally enlightened principles.

The young oil- and gas-rich nation of Kazakhstan, whose geography takes in a majestic panorama of seas, alpine forests, steppes, deserts and snowfields, is home to something like 140 ethnic groups of every possible cultural background and religious persuasion. As well as the

indigenous Kazakhs, here are established Nestorian Christian and Sufi communities, indigenous Buddhist groups and shamanic nomads still roaming the steppes, as well as a large population of Jews who fled here after the Romans sacked Jerusalem in the second century CE; besides which there are Jewish converts known as Khazars who have migrated eastward and settled in their thousands in this foreign land.

An ex-Communist with visionary ideals, the President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev seems determined to democratise Islam, although not perhaps in the western style. Breaking the traditional Muslim mould of power-driven dynastic autocracy that featured until very recently in all the Muslim caliphates, he recently rejected a referendum that would give him a further ten years in office, and showed readiness to actually shorten the term of presidential office. He has initiated the People’s Assembly of Kazakhstan, which gives every ethnic group the right to take part in the decision-making congresses associated with the political, cultural and social activities of the country. And his attitude to women is also modern. Schools for girls are a priority, with attention given to getting girls into science and technology.

The main thrust of Nazarbayev’s initiatives is clearly to bring into international dialogue the various divisive issues that press most heavily on the global community at present. Astana hosts a number of world congresses, including the World Federation of Neurosurgical Societies and a World Conference on Disarmament, while the First Almaty Economic Business Forum may be held in Astana in 2012. But the President’s chief initiative remains one that first materialised in 1992, soon after Kazakhstan’s independence from the Soviet Union. In 2003 the Congress of the Leaders of World and Traditional Religions was held with great success in Astana, and again in 2006 and 2009. Emphasis was laid on the principles that bind religions together rather than those that separate them.

In October 2010 the World Forum for Spiritual Culture, intended for a more general interdisciplinary gathering, was held in Astana, again chaired by the Kazakhstan President and imbued with the religious tolerance for which the ancient shamanic races of this region, such as the Mongols and also the Sufi orders, have long been famous.4 As the British scholar and philosopher Peter Kingsley notes, “It was no small practical

achievement for the Mongol Khans to transform into a major institution the long-standing Central Asian custom of convening formal gatherings made up of representatives from different religions so they could openly discuss their beliefs on an equal footing instead of just killing each other.”5

According to the same open principle, high-level representatives from about seventy-five countries, “from all cultures, ‘cults’ and worldviews,” attended the historic gathering in Astana. In his Conference report on the International Forum for Peace through Culture, Augustat stated that the world initiative launched by Kazakhstan’s President is based on non-violence, harmony and cooperation between nations. “The core problem of our present time is formed of lethargy, extreme egoism, greed, corruption, purely materialist thinking and so forth – all of which have to be exchanged for real human values.”6

Similar world gatherings to those in Kazakhstan are of course being held elsewhere, for example in Turkey and Australia very recently. But

the key objective of the Executive Committee of Spiritual Culture as proposed by President Nazarbayev strikes

another new and even more revolutionary note. It aims at nothing less than the furtherance of an integration of science, socio-politics and religion in one overarching transcendental order. As Kingsley notes, from the very earliest times but now long lost, this idea of a comprehensive divine whole uniting all that exists was also a core principle of the philosophy of central Asian shamanism from which the Sun religion directly emerged, and in which there was a constant overlapping of “spirituality and science, mechanical ingenuity and philosophy, mysticism and military expertise,”7 as well as poetry, gnosis and politics.

Consequently, one of the most important highlights that came out of

the Kazakhstan World Forum, notes Augustat, is the awareness of the necessity of a synthesis of the political and spiritual-cultural as well as scientific spheres in society, and the gradual overcoming of their present entrenched

separation. This very postmodern approach, which even today is entertained by only a minority of western thinkers as the

necessary basis for a more enlightened world civilisation,

characterises the Kazakhstan Executive and raises the interesting question: where is this intellectual initiative coming from?

What hidden metaphysical influence is at work here?

The Sacred Union of the East

As we shall shortly see, President Nazarbayev’s is not the first attempt in modern times to reestablish in the Eurasian heartland a nation based on enlightened spiritual principles. Seventy years before the birth of the Kazakhstan nation a similar Buddhist attempt was essayed in the Altai in southern Siberia. Nazarbayev’s has been guided, it would seem, by a different star, a gnostic vision from a far more distant time; but nevertheless, the earlier attempt to establish a Buddhist New Country of New Russia in the Altai may well be seen as a rehearsal for Kazakhstan’s more ambitious Muslim experiment.

After the 1917 Revolution in Russia, says Znamensky, Communism took on a religious quality “typical of religious revitalisation movements in tribal societies.”8 In his book Red Shambhala, he reveals the underground occult agenda of a visionary Russian clique working within the very core of the new Bolshevik State to bring about a political condition impregnated with the Buddhist wisdom of Shambhala. Inspired by Buddhist prophesies, this clandestine group active within the Soviet Secret Police believed that the social ideals of Communism were compatible with those foretold of the Buddha Maitreya, the One to Come, and that with the amalgamation of the two a glorious mystical era of Communism would result that would benefit the whole world. So persuasive was this vision that for a while the movement gathered many Communist adherents, and indeed was to be destroyed only by the later Stalinist purges. But not before a number of expeditions were either planned or actually sent forth from Russia and elsewhere in eastern Europe, with the intention of finding the fabled kingdom and embracing its immortal teachings.

One of these expeditions – and the most celebrated – was launched from New York by the painter Nicholas Roerich and his wife Helena, White Russian emigres to America and passionate converts to the new Theosophical teachings promulgated by another Russian, Helena Blavatsky. Nicholas established a Master art school in New York and Helena, a mystical clairvoyant, channelled guidance from Masters

Morya and Koot Hoomi, the same Mahatmas whom Blavatsky had claimed as her unseen Adepts and spiritual mentors a few decades earlier. (According to recent research, these two Masters were most probably Hindu and Sikh Indians, presumably high initiates in their respective religions.)9 The Roerichs were also strongly influenced by the shamanic teachings and legends of Shambhala that had been trickling into Russia from Russian expatriates in southern Siberia for the past hundred or so years; and in 1923, at the behest of the Master Morya and under his continual guidance, the Roerichs set out for central Asia on an arduous odyssey to find the wondrous kingdom.

Behind the ostensible reason for the expedition was a hidden agenda of the greatest import, which Master Morya impressed on them was the additional meaning of the prophesy of Shambhala. Shambhala, he said, was “not only the abode of mystical Buddhist learning, it was the guiding principle of the coming cosmic age.”10 Its further meaning would unfold in the establishment of a sacred New Country, a New Russia in the Altai, a mountainous country in southern Siberia lying at the intersection of Mongolia, Kazakhstan and Tibet. There the Roerichs were to found the New Country on the highest Buddhist principles. It was to be governed at a spiritual level by the exiled Tibetan Panchen Lama – whom they were commissioned to find somewhere in Mongolia and bring back to the Altai – and on an administrative level by Nicholas himself, who sometimes wore the robes of the Tibetan Dalai Lama.

According to Znamensky, the Roerichs envisaged in the Altai a utopian theocracy composed of “a commonwealth of people who would live a highly spiritual life and work as a cooperative – the economic foundation of this new state.”11 In fact the New Country was to be nothing less than a unification of all Inner Asian peoples into a spiritual kingdom. Thus would be established the Sacred Union of the East.

…To trace the bond that does undoubtedly seem to exist between these two regional ventures seventy years apart, we must delve more deeply into the nature of the ancient spiritual hierarchy that lies at an even more hidden level beneath Shambhala’s folk mythology.

The Rising Sun in Asian History

What then is the source of Kazakhstan’s unusual and potentially revolutionary geopolitical objectives? To find a precedent for them we have only to turn back to the great days of the Sun religion that peaked during the third millennium BC.

… Even as the Earth and the stars of the firmament were seen as related elements of one transcendental order, so that divine Whole was believed to be inclusive of, and to bring into relationship all areas of human knowledge, whether they be religious, psychosocial or physical. Two famous historical figures who fall into this category are Visvakarma of the Arunachala temple in India, a renowned expert in geometry and number, and Imhotep, ancient high priest of Heliopolis in Egypt, an engineer and architect who famously built the step pyramid at Saqqara. By means of this policy of multidisciplinary integration which brought together at all levels the opposite poles of human knowledge, those of the spiritual and natural orders, societies were unified at a high overall level, but without stifling the creative potential that lies in the challenges of diversity and opposition.

… But it is in Kazakhstan that it is arguably causing what may well become a fully flowering Muslim cultural renaissance of the highest order, a rising of the Sun of gnosis which will affect the whole of Islam.

In President Nazarbayev’s gatherings of eminent representatives of all the religions on Earth, and in his insistence on bringing together the various spiritual and scientific disciplines in one comprehensive embrace, something quite unique may be happening in Central Asia that will have important consequences for the peace and harmony not only of Islam but of the rest of the world.. This is a time of critical challenges and perhaps only time will tell.

A Vision for the future from Kazakhstan: Eurasian Monetary System and Strategies for Development Come Carpentier de Gourdon 11 Jun 2012

http://www.vijayvaani.com/FrmPublicDisplayArticle.aspx?id=2334

Historical Context: Before he became President of a newly independent Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev was chairman of the Kazakh Supreme Soviet in the last days of the USSR. Chairman Mikhail Gorbachev had tapped

him to be the Prime Minister of the reformed Federation he was trying to set up when the August 1991 Coup took place and, by default, brought to power in Moscow Boris Yeltsin who, with the blessings of the West, hurriedly proceeded to disband the Soviet Union, thereby hatching with one blow fifteen sovereign nations.

Among all those new countries, Kazakhstan can with some reservations be regarded as the greatest success story, and much of that relatively peaceful transition out of the post-Soviet quagmire can be credited to Nazarbayev who always acted with the conviction that independence was not an end in itself and had to be utilized to build prosperity, both in his nation and in the wider region. From the early 1990s, he consistently championed the reorganization of the common former Soviet space through such vehicles as the CIS, the CSTO and the EURASEC, while proposing at the same time a common currency and economic community for all Central Asian states, including Iran.

Eurasian interdependence and solidarity were not empty words in his vocabulary, a view especially valuable in that it could not be attributed to Russian or Pan-Slavic chauvinism. Nazarbayev defines himself as a proud descendent of the nomadic rulers of the vast steppes who on various occasions in the last three thousand years unified much of the Eurasian continent under various historical avatars, such as the Scythians or Sakas, Turks and Mongols, all members of the loose commonwealth of horse riding herdsmen and warriors who held sway from the Caspian to Manchuria and from Southern Siberia to Northern Afghanistan.

Nazarbayev draws much of his supra-nationalist inspiration from the late Prof. Lev Gumilev (son of Anna Akhmatova) after whom he has named the new university in Astana. Gumilev, who enjoys a wide following in the Russian and Central Asian academic community, believed that Russians were related, within the Eurasian “superethnos”, to the Turko-Mongols and other peoples of the steppes and that

the Tsar’s empire was a continuation of the earlier Scythian and Genghiskhanid continental states.

Kazakhstan, territorially the largest of the Central Asian States, occupies the core of the Eurasian mass which Halford Mackinder defined as the heartland. As such it is the cradle of the founders of the Seljukid, Ottoman, Mughal, Qajar (Kadjar, Persian) and other empires, and it separates or connects, depending upon our perspective, China and Iran, Russia and South Asia. Like the empire of the Kushans in the 1st and 2nd centuries AD, Kazakhstan is deeply influenced by all those neighbouring cultures and it is Nazarbayev’s vision not to artificially homogenize his young nation state by ignoring or understating those “foreign elements,” but rather to highlight them in the process of building a synthesis conceived as a union without assimilation. The new capital built by his decision illustrates that syncretistic spirit through clear allusions to the various architectural styles of the civilizations which have shaped modern Kazakhstan: Astana, in its contemporary, often futuristic architecture, deploys facades, spires and prospekts reminiscent of Romanov and Stalinist Moscow and Saint Petersburg alongside Chinese pagodas, Turkish domes, Mongol Yurts, Egyptian pyramids and Arab minarets. One distinguishing aspect of Nazarbayev’s action, however, is that he is not satisfied with merely building a pharaonic capital, like the fabled Karakota of Genghis Khan, the Xanadu of Kubilai or the Samarkand of Timur. Neither is he merely trying to make Kazakhstan one of the states that matter on the global scene in view of its size, mineral wealth and strategic location. He sees Kazakhstan as a fulcrum and a testing ground for a new international architecture to integrate the Eurasian continent and eventually the world as a whole, and for several years he has advocated a number of measures designed to bring about that ambitious goal which, in the context of unfolding events, appears increasingly necessary.

It would seem rather futile for the head of a remote,

landlocked, sparsely populated newly independent state with has a short track record in global diplomacy to pursue such lofty objectives. However, Nazarbayev’s background experience near the pinnacle of the Soviet State and his privileged relations with both the Russian and Chinese leadership as well as his cordial rapport with the governments of the United States and the European Union give him unusual outreach and a rare ability to be heard far and wide. He has made Kazakhstan a member of both the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE), the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO) and the Organization of the Islamic Conference (OIC), thereby affirming its vocation as the archetypal Eurasian state, similar to Russia in that sense. Further, in consonance with the ideal of global peaceful coexistence and disarmament, the Kazakh nation under his leadership renounced and dismantled the nuclear weapons it inherited from its past in the USSR, although it joined the CSTO as a structure intended to protect common regional security from outside threats.

Diagnosis and Goals Beyond merely vying to make his country win in the global economic casino on the strength of its large reserves of oil, gas and strategic minerals, Nazarbayev has conducted a scholarly, sharp-sighted analysis of the current system which he has defined, “Neoliberal ideology with its hegemonic monetary system does not promote the creation of global, innovative, technological and socio-cultural preconditions for transition to a new cycle of evolutionary development” (“Anti-Crisis Plan of N A Nazarbayev”, by S N Nugerbekov, 2011).

He accordingly calls for “a cardinal transformation of the economic system”. To that effect he has taken a number of initiatives, beginning with the annual convening of

the Astana Economic Forum, gathering many top ranking economists, scientists, business and political leaders and resulting in the creation of G-Global, a more broad based response to the Western-sponsored G-8 and G-20 that he sees as a tool for building “Global Partnership among civilizations” according to the principles defined between India and China in 1954 as the basis for the famous Panchsheel agreement and in tune with the Russian-led World Public Forum Dialogue of Civilizations. An interface between G-Global and G-20 is an informal think tank referred to as Think20 which met in Guadalajara, Mexico, prior to the last G-20 Summit in that country in March 2012 and issued a report to the G-20 Sherpas.

On the spiritual and cultural level, the Kazakh President is a promoter of the traditional Asian notion of unity in diversity … In that view, all religions – and Kazakhstan is inhabited by Turkic and Iranian Muslims, Orthodox Slav and Protestant Germanic Christians, Jews and Buddhist-Confucians of Korean origin, along with several other ethno-religious minorities - can commune in the awareness of the universal transcendent principle which in the Turco-Mongol spiritual realm is honored as “Tengri” the father Sky or Heaven.

In that spirit Astana hosts every year a World Spiritual Forum of religious leaders, metaphysically aware scientists and independent seekers.

Like his peers in Russia, Putin and Medvedev, who support him in his politico-economic initiative, Nazarbayev takes a technical, pragmatic approach to the fulfillment of his broader goals. Having concluded that “old financial instruments have lost their credibility and (that) new ones have yet to be developed” (ibid., p. 13), the President advocated the creation of a new global reserve currency based no longer on a virtual “fiat” dollar, whose emission is under the sole control of a public-private US financial cartel, but on a basket of the world’s most influential economies, according to objective criteria of real assets and productivity. His

recommendations find support in the Think20 2012 report which prescribes “economic policy measures leading to investment-led and innovation-driven growth, transforming energy production and use in advance and developing countries,” as the new currency he proposes is envisioned as a tool to achieve this innovative process of development.

Nazarbayev has mustered the support of both the Russian and Chinese Governments as well as a general endorsement of his diagnosis by Nobel Prize winning economist Robert Mundell and several other luminaries in the field. His analysis dovetails with the conclusions of the Italo-Russian Modena initiative of 2008, coordinated by Paolo Raimondi, Yuri Gromyko and Mikhail Baydakov which resulted in the creation of the international Long Term Investors Club (LTIC), gathering a number of major public investment institutions.

A consensus on a strategy for real, inclusive and sustainable development, inspired by John Maynard Keynes’ theses has thereby emerged and it represents an alternative to the current quest for arithmetic, statistical growth of the economy, bereft of any wider interdisciplinary considerations and criteria. One of the seminal documents for that “dissident” perspective is the D8-D20 statement issued by the International Economic Forum West-East (Integration and Development) at its meeting of 26 June 2009 in Moscow, used for the May 2012 Astana Meeting dedicated to the definition of monetary currencies and other financial instruments that can act as catalysts to trigger and shape a new wave of inclusive global economic growth.

The presidential views are reflected in the earlier quoted essay: “In order to instigate the crash of capitalism it is enough to start paying out the bare minimum to market participants or even worse, create a faulty measure of the market economy” (ibid. p. 18), which is precisely what has happened in the neoliberal scenario where globalised capital moves across borders at the speed of light, seeking ever higher return for its owners at the expense of the workforce and of the very welfare of the nations in which it has been accumulated. This outcome

vindicates the predictions of Keynes who, in the words of H Minsky, made “(…) a powerful argument that capitalism was by its very nature unstable and prone to collapse. Far from tending toward some magical state of equilibrium, capitalism would inevitably do the opposite. It would lurch over a cliff”.

As part of the process for integrating Eurasia and making it a pivot for a new global monetary system as well as an incubator for industrial transformation, the Government of Kazakhstan has in the last few years set up a series of institutions, including the Eurasian Business Congress, the Eurasian Club of Scientists and the Eurasian Bank of New Technologies.

Ways and Means to Eurasian Integration

For that integration to be functional, a cutting edge network of transport and communication must be built, thereby stimulating the economies of the greater region through the creation of new financial instruments intended to fund those ambitious projects of technological and human development which are envisioned as the infrastructure for a new silk road connecting East Asia with Europe and Africa across Russia, Kazakhstan and their neighbours, extending eventually to the South Asian subcontinent and the Near East through Afghanistan, Iran and the Caspian Sea.

India and Pakistan both have major stakes in such a plan, as illustrated in practice by the recent launch of the TAPI (Turkmenistan-Afghanistan-Pakistan-India) gas pipeline project as also by the long-standing Indo-Irano-Russian design for the “Southern corridor”, a highway for rail, road and telecommunications stretching from Bandar Abbas on the Persian Gulf to the Baltic and Western Europe.

One vital artery of that network would be the high speed magnetic levitation railways carrying people and goods from Korea and China all the way to Istanbul and Amsterdam with considerable savings in money and time over the oceanic route. In the centre of that web, Kazakhstan would

resume its traditional situation as a bridge between the four quarters of Eurasia “from ocean to ocean”. There is even a perspective of extending that multi-mode communication highway through the Behring Strait to North America and due account is taken of similar schemes in the works for Latin American integration from Mexico to Tierra de Fuego.

Building such a transcontinental physical framework requires considerable financial means which can hardly be found in the current global predicament, marked by unsustainable indebtedness and concentration of capital in speculative short-term operations. The President of Kazakhstan has often pointed out the disturbing fact that “only 10 to 20% of the world monetary base is channeled towards actual production of commodities”, while up to 90% is made up of virtual and derivative financial instruments used solely for speculative transactions. The present world currency system, he emphasizes, known as “the 1976 Jamaica regime” is “not supervised by anyone and not democratic” (Nazarbayev’s Speech at the 3rd Astana Forum, 2010). As an alternative, he proposes a single supra-national currency, towards whose creation he defined three necessary steps:

1. Defining a new paradigm in accordance with current realities and challenges.

2. Adjusting monetary and financial systems to basic interests, purposes and values of all key actors.

3. Aligning monetary and financial instruments with proposed solutions for a radical reinvention of the global system.

Rather than a global new “coin” as a “super-dollar” in the literal sense, what emerges as the Astana Consensus looks more like a stable conversion regime between the major world currencies, including some regional ones still to be created (in EURASEC, South America, East and South Asia or Africa) as the expression of an agreement

between the most important members of the international community from all continents on the basis of their real natural, human, technological and scientific resources. In the context of the present widening and worsening crisis, such a proposal acquires an aura of inevitability.

However, before a global agreement can be forged to implement Kazakhstan’s proposal (which has some trappings of a joint Kazakh-Russian-Chinese initiative), specific ad hoc credit instruments can and should be generated to fund large scale national or international projects intended to catalyse an economic recovery and the transition to new technologies. This is perhaps the most practical proposal, in the short and medium term, to emerge from the Modena, Moscow and Astana deliberations.

New Global Currency System

In the broader framework, the initial basket of SDR (Special Drawing Rights of the IMF) conceived by the Bretton Woods system and since substantially modified, should be expanded to include the Chinese Yuan, the Korean Won, the Russian Rouble, the Brazilian Real, the Indian Rupee, the South African Rand, the Saudi Rial and perhaps also the Turkish Pound and the Iranian Rial, but consideration is being given to the option of linking this new global fixed exchange regime to gold or to a basket of strategic commodities in order to enhance its stability and win trust.

… all pave the way towards an alternative international financial system not based on a hegemonic national currency.

The shaken European Union is now uncertain of its fate and in doubt about the survival of the Euro. In this context, the growing and officially acknowledged partnership between Germany and Russia signals that the centre of gravity of the continental economy is moving East and that Berlin is readying for an alternative arrangement if the Euro system

cannot be maintained. On the other hand, it appears likely that if Greece and other Southern and Eastern European nations are either cut loose from the common EU currency or are unable to join it, they will gravitate towards the Eurasian hub of monetary and financial stability which is developing between Moscow, Beijing and Astana.

Opinions are divided between economists as to whether a drastic downsizing of the Eurozone or even a disintegration of the single European currency would lead to a reassertion of Dollar hegemony over the world, or would on the contrary precipitate the advent of a global multi-currency basket regime as an alternative since the Euro’s downfall might trigger the Greenback’s demise.

At the 5th Astana Economic Forum in May 2012, the recommendations of two eminent economists, among others, deserve to be noted as they are being taken into account in the design of the new financial system being devised. Prof. Henry CK Liu strongly advocated that all major exporting countries demand payment in their own currencies and not in Dollars, while Prof. Jeff Sommers emphasized that, rather than accumulating “fiat” financial capital, inherently fragile and elusive as it is inevitably wiped in course of time, national policies should focus on investing in public infrastructure and human welfare (including health, education, recreational amenities etc…) for which, as Liu has pointed out, human capital is needed and not so much financial resources, as the latter can be created through the emission of instruments of public credit. Both experts agree that priority must be given to “growth in jobs and livelihoods (as opposed to) the mistaken policy of “expansionary contraction” which is bringing about depression (THINK-20 Meeting Report, March 2012). This is also the view held in Latin America by the governments of the UNASUR member states.

In this perspective the intractable and never ending accumulation of public and private debt whose sheer weight is crushing the real world economy may be viewed as a conceptual burden which can be at least partly eliminated by canceling it, as most of it is usurious seniorage levied by those

who hold a monopoly on the creation of a virtual global currency supported by nothing except faith in the ability of the US government to keep its promises (or fear of American military power).

Accordingly, the Think20 Report highlights the need for a systematic sovereign debt restructuring process in order to “liberate sovereign credit for domestic development” as Ellen Brown, Michael Hudson and Henry Liu prescribe. The report also advocates “open source technology development and transfer” and increasing “transparency in commodity markets through the development of price discovery mechanisms”.

Some Final Considerations

An expert on the Japanese and American economies who also participated at Astana, Eamon Fingleton, provided a unforgiving analysis of the American economy which has become a Dollar printing machine controlled by speculative capitalists and has systematically encouraged the outsourcing of the country’s technological and manufacturing base to foreign nations in order to buy most goods abroad with its virtual currency. As a result, the USA is now sinking under a pyramid of public and private debt which is fast approaching the size of its shrinking GDP, fed mainly by domestic consumption of imports and a hypertrophied real estate market. Most of its major companies have moved abroad – and offshore – for all practical purposes and are no longer meaningfully contributing to the national tax base, whereas the country has lost its industrial and high tech productive autonomy.

In Fingleton’s view, the US’ chaotic collapse is inevitable because of its inability to reform a system which is highly beneficial to the hegemonic financial corporate and “rentier” elites. Henry Liu has a less pessimistic take, although he agrees that America will have to undertake some drastic and painful reforms if it wishes to survive as a powerful nation. The American government may continue to oppose and block as much and as long as it can, radical reforms to the current status quo, especially those not under its control, and

many of the measures advocated from Kazakhstan and other like minded states will probably have to be implemented against Washington’s will, given that the ability of the USA to enforce its choices on the rest of the world is already reduced, although the country may still resort to military means, internally or abroad, to prevent outcomes it does not agree with...

The author is Convener, Editorial Board, World Affairs Journal. In 1999, he co-founded the Telesis Academy in Switzerland, dedicated to the study of the ancient wisdom of East and West in the contemporary scientific context. He has been associated with the Nuclear Disarmament Forum and the Foundation of Global Dialog in Switzerland

Extracto del discurso del Presidente de la República Kazajstán N.A. Nazarbayev en la reunión con los Jefes de misiones diplomáticas extranjeras, acreditadas en Kazajstán a principios de 2012

¡Estimados Embajadores y Jefes de misiones!

¡Señoras y Señores!

Llevamos a cabo nuestra tradicional reunión en el año de aniversario para la política exterior de Kazajstán.

Hoy se cumplen 20 años desde que nuestro país entró a formar parte de las Naciones Unidas.

En enero se cumplieron 20 años desde el establecimiento de las relaciones diplomáticas con la República Popular de China, Gran Bretaña, Francia, en febrero – con Alemania, y en marzo – con Turquía.

Y así va a ser cada mes de este año con todos los países con las que mantenemos ahora relaciones diplomáticas.

En mayo se cumplen 20 años desde mi primera visita oficial a Estados Unidos en la calidad del Presidente de estado.

En ese mismo mes vamos a celebrar el aniversario del “gran” Tratado de amistad, cooperación y asistencia mutua con la Federación Rusa.

….

En cuarto lugar, vemos grandes oportunidades con los países de la región en colectivo pueden ser un puesto clave de la comunidad internacional en la lucha contra el terrorismo internacional y extremismo, migración ilegal, el tráfico de drogas y otros problemas contemporáneos.

En este sentido Kazajstán da la bienvenida a las actividades de los organismos especializados de la Naciones Unidas, OSCE (Organización para la Seguridad y la Cooperación en Europa. Ver http://www.osce.org/) y otras organizaciones internacionales.

Kazajstán ve su misión en la región en el fortalecimiento constante de la seguridad y la estabilidad regional.

Estamos dispuestos a profundizar nuestra cooperación en todos los temas y cuestiones de seguridad regional, en particular, en el marco de la Organización del Tratado de la seguridad colectiva, de la Organización de Cooperación de Shangai, Conferencia sobre Interacción y Medidas de Construcción de Confianza en Asia - CICA, así como programas de afiliación con OTAN y otras estructuras internacionales.

¡Distinguidos Embajadores y Jefes de misiones diplomáticas!

Me gustaría hacer hincapié en los puntos importantes relacionados con la participación de Kazajstán en las organizaciones internacionales macro-regionales y mundiales.

Primero. Este año es un aniversario para el proceso de interacción y medidas de fomento de la confianza en Asia.

La convocatoria de CICA fue una de las primeras iniciativas de la política exterior independiente de Kazajstán, presentada por mí hace veinte años desde la tribuna de la 47ª sesión de la Asamblea General de la ONU e implementada con éxito.

Established in 1974, the Confederation of International Contractors' Associations (CICA) represents the Construction Industry at the world level. The Worldwide Construction Industry, involving contractors of all sizes, represents a global turnover of US$ 4.8 trillion and employs around 110 million employees. (http://www.cicanet.com/)

Estamos muy contentos con el constante desarrollo de este proceso durante dos décadas.

CICA casi ha llegado a tal nivel de interacción que implica la transición a una forma más eficiente de su participación en el sistema de relaciones internacionales en Eurasia y a nivel global.

Se trata de la perspectiva de creación de una completa y nueva organización de Interacción y Medidas de Construcción de Confianza en Asia - OICA.

Es este el contexto en el que deben trabajar todos los participantes de CICA en los próximos años.

Segundo. Yo como el Presidente del país y anfitrión en diciembre de 2010 de la Cumbre de la OSCE me preocupa la falta de dinámica en la realización de la Declaración de Astana.

In the The 2010s The OSCE starts the new decade with Kazakhstan at its helm, the first Central Asian state to chair the Organization. ( http://www.osce.org/who/87)

…

Espero que Ustedes informen de mi posición y de la preocupación a sus Gobiernos y dirigentes de las organizaciones internacionales.

Tercero. La participación global es la esencia de nuestra política exterior en las próximas décadas.

Kazajstán siempre ha sido y sigue siendo un jugador digno, emprendedor en la política regional y mundial.

Hemos cerrado el polígono de Semipalatinsk, hemos renunciado a poseer armas nucleares y llamamos a todos los países a adoptar la Declaración universal de mundo libre de armas nucleares.

Nuestra participación en el movimiento global para prohibir las armas nucleares es consciente y fundamental.

Tenemos la intención de participar activamente en la próxima Cumbre global antinuclear en Seúl para presentar nuevas propuestas.

Kazajstán ha sido y sigue comprometido con el desarrollo del diálogo interreligioso e intercultural.

Su importancia en el mundo moderno solo aumenta.

Este año se celebrará en Astana el IV Congreso de los Líderes de Religiones Mundiales y Tradicionales.

Hemos invitado a este foro a los representantes de todas las religiones, políticos, figuras públicos de diferentes países, y tenemos confianza en el éxito del próximo foro. Vemos el gran interés de los Jefes de Estados y Gobiernos y de los líderes religiosos del mundo.

Cuarto. Para Kazajstán siempre ha sido importante mantenerse en línea con las principales tendencias del desarrollo mundial.

Nuestra política exterior nunca ha sufrido de una ingenuidad geopolítica. Por lo tanto, teniendo en cuenta el proceso de regionalización de la economía y política mundial en el siglo XXI, nosotros profundizamos en la integración euroasiática.

Kazajstán, Bielorrusia y Rusia forman un Espacio económico único. Una vez más quiero hacer hincapié en que esta unión es económica.

Vamos paulatinamente a la creación de la Unión económica euroasiática.

Este es un factor importante para la estabilidad regional, la mejora de competitividad de nuestras economías, la garantía de un gran avance tecnológico. Un año y medio de trabajo en base a estos acuerdos muestran en la práctica los beneficios de esta unión para todos los estados.

Quinto. Hoy en día la arquitectura mundial se puso en marcha.

Se han expresado muchas opiniones, que, desde mi punto de vista, a veces demonizan la situación mundial.

Si estudiamos cuidadosamente la historia, se puede ver que el mundo nunca ha sido fácil. En mi opinión, la característica de la situación actual radica en el hecho de que la humanidad se pasa a un estado cualitativamente nuevo. La esencia de este paso es la ampliación de la gama de la sociedad de información planetaria.

Las tecnologías de información y las capacidades «instan» al progreso en casi todos los países.

Pero no podemos ignorar el hecho que los métodos de la «modernización avanzada », sobre todo, en lo que se refiere a los temas de «estímulos externos» de los cambios políticos no preparados en ciertas sociedades, no son productivos. Esto se demuestra por la historia de los últimos años.

En este caso a veces se olvidan las sabias palabras de uno de los diplomáticos más importantes, que “podemos apoyarnos en la bayoneta, pero no puede sentarse en ella”. Así lo dijo Talleyrand.

Por lo tanto yo considero que esta práctica no tiene perspectivas en el siglo XXI.

Sexto. La Sociedad de información global, en la que se convierte nuestro mundo, requiere nuevos enfoques en las relaciones internacionales.

Sobre todo, tiene que ser justo el orden en el que se toman de decisiones globales.

La realidad es que ni el G8, ni G20 ya no son suficientes. Así que he propuesto un nuevo formato el G-GLOBAL – una plataforma más amplia para buscar las soluciones de los problemas

actuales del sistema financiero mundial y para elaborar un amplio pacto anticrisis de la ONU.

G-GLOBAL es una invitación a cooperación e interacción de todos los estados, organismos intergubernamentales y no gubernamentales de la política mundial, así como los políticos individuales, personalidades públicas, expertos y científicos.

G-GLOBAL es a la vez y virtual (vía Internet) y una forma real de diálogo. Nuestro sitio web dedicado a este tema se ha convertido en uno de los más visitados.

En este formato llevamos a cabo la preparación para el Foro Económico de Astana que se celebrara en mayo de este año. Invito a todas las partes interesadas a participar en este evento.

Séptimo. La política mundial tiene que basarse en nuevos fundamentos globales.

Con respecto al siglo XXI, son multilateralismo constructivo y transparencia, confianza y tolerancia política, la prioridad de las formas evolutivas del desarrollo mundial. Estos fundamentos deben estar fijados en los documentos básicos de la ONU y todo el sistema del derecho internacional.

Como dicen los diplomáticos, el elemento más fuerte de las relaciones internacionales en todo momento es el papel.

Al mismo tiempo es importante que todos los estados reconozcan la responsabilidad conjunta por el destino de la región y del mundo en general.

Es preciso trabajar más estrechamente en todo el bloque de las cuestiones de desarrollo sostenible.

Nosotros ponemos grandes expectativas en la Conferencia Mundial «Rio+20», que se celebra en junio de este año. Kazajstán, como sabemos, había propuesto la iniciativa «Puente Verde», encaminada a la transferencia de tecnologías “verdes”, creación de bosques artificiales y paisajes naturales.

Además el año pasado en la ONU, yo propuse aprobar la Estrategia global de energía y medio ambiente.

Los expertos estiman que en los próximos 20 años las necesidades de la humanidad crecerán en un 40 por ciento. Al mismo tiempo más de 1,5 mil millones de personas viven sin electricidad.

Tenemos previsto hablar de estos temas en el foro, en Rio de Janeiro.

Estos son nuestros enfoques de desarrollo actual y futuro de nuestro país, la región de Asia Central y todo el mundo.…

Aquellos de Ustedes que recientemente han comenzado a trabajar en Astana han visto este invierno, lo severo que puede ser nuestro clima.

Pero a diferencia de la naturaleza que es impredecible, las relaciones de Kazajstán con todos los países siempre están «en positivo».

Nosotros lo apreciamos y haremos todo para que el potencial de nuestras relaciones se fortalezca.

Akorda, 2 de marzo de 2012

IV CONGRESS OF LEADERS OF WORLD AND TRADITIONAL

RELIGIONS

(May 30-31 2012, Astana)

AGENDA

1. First session of the Council of Religious Leaders

2. Plenary session: “Peace and harmony as the choice of mankind”.

3. Panel session ¹1: “The role of religious leaders in achieving sustainable development”. Speeches and discussions.

4. Panel session ¹2: “Religion and multiculturalism”. Speeches and discussions.

5. Panel session ¹3: “Religion and woman: spiritual values and contemporary challenges”. Speeches and discussions.

6. Panel session ¹4: “Religion and the youth”. Speeches and discussions.

7. Adoption of the “Appeal by participants of the IV Congress of Leaders of World and Traditional Religions”.

Kazakhstan President wants scientists to discover theories of ‘eternal life’! Submitted by Raman Iyer on Wed, 12/08/2010 - 13:25

Astana, Dec 8 : Kazakhstan''s seventy-year-old President Nursultan Nazarbayev appears to be `not too satisfied' with his 19 years of rule over the gas-rich central Asian state, with reports claiming that he has urged scientists to unlock the secret to immortality.

According to The Guardian, Nazarbayev stressed in a speech that a new scientific research institute in the Astana should study the "rejuvenation of the organism," and also "the human genome, production of human tissue and creation of gene-based medicines".

"As for the medicine of the future, people of my age are really hoping all of this will happen as soon as possible," the President said.

Two months back, an ethnic Korean delegate at Kazakhstan''s People''s Assembly proposed that Nazarbayev should stay in power until 2020, to which the President answered: "Maybe, then, you''ll offer me an elixir of youth and energy - maybe you have such potions in Korea . I''m willing to go on until 2020, just find me an elixir."

The latest plea is the third time in just over a year that Nazarbayev has urged scientists to find a way to defeat death.

In September 2009, he had said that "anti-ageing medicine, natural rejuvenation, immortality," are topics, which scientists are concentrating on these days.

"Those who do are the most successful states in the world - those who don''t will get left on the sidelines," he said. (ANI)

KAZAKHSTAN: NUCLER FUEL BANK TO OPEN SOON?

Sunday 18 March 2012 http://www.eureporter.co/2012/3/kazakhstan-nuclear-f/

By Colin Stevens

As a response to growing tension between Iran and the West, Kazakhstan has made a proposal - to create an international nuclear fuel bank to secure the storage of small supplies of enriched uranium for nuclear power plants.

‘Once again I confirm our readiness to host the Nuclear fuel bank on our territory and hope that our initiative will find support’ – said President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev. -…We shouldn’t allow the humanity to satisfy its immanent desire of self-destruction’.

This initiative will be discussed at the upcoming "2012 Seoul Nuclear Security Summit" in March 2012. The largest summit in the security field devoted to international cooperative measures to protect nuclear materials and facilities from terrorist groups, it will engage numerous heads of state and international organizations.

The initiative of Kazakhstan has a potential positive effect both direct and indirect on a number of problems: measures to combat the threat of nuclear terrorism; protection of nuclear materials and prevention of illicit trafficking.

Despite the growing awareness of the threat of military use of nuclear power, some states continue to trump up their nuclear arsenals; others are out to obtain them.

Kazakhstan is an authentic exception: It used to be the fourth nuclear power in the world before the collapse of the Soviet Union; it became the first and the only country to renounce it.

‘We rose above the global threat and made a principle choice in favour of non-proliferation for our country and the world’- commented President Nazarbayev on this historic step.

In the past couple of decades, the world increasingly feels a security threat.

First and foremost - the threat of further spread and use of weapons of mass destruction, especially nuclear. The main challenge of our times - the ownership of such a weapon not only by nuclear powers but potentially by terrorist groups. Moreover the recent history shows the reason behind the fears of a nuclear bomb to emerge in the "axis of evil’ states.

In late 60s of the twentieth century the first treaty limiting nuclear weapons - the Treaty on the Non-proliferation of Nuclear Weapons - initiated efforts to secure international control over the movement of such weapons and attempts of its "spontaneous" use. Today, along with modern versions of "non-proliferation treaties," control of the world nuclear industry is shaped by the International Atomic Energy Agency.

Kazakhstan is one of the most active and influential champions of the increased efforts of the international community to strengthen the Comprehensive Nuclear-Ban-Test Treaty (CTBT) 1996 and to increase global awareness about the devastating affects of nuclear weapons tests.

In Kazakhstan over 40 years there were more that 450 tests that caused the contamination of large territories, comparable to the size of a big European country, like France or Germany. More than one and a half million citizens suffered serious health damages.

Taking into consideration that experience of Soviet times, today Kazakhstan is one of the most active participants in the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism (GICNT), launched in 2006 by the presidents of the United States and Russia.

At the initiative of President Nursultan Nazarbayev the GICNT conference was hosted in Astana in September 2010. It focused on combating the financing terrorism and the first meeting of the Panel on the Implementation and Evaluation.

Kazakhstan has also applied for participation in the Global Partnership against the Spread of Weapons of Mass Destruction at "G8". In this framework the measures are taken to reduce the amount of dangerous nuclear, radiological, chemical and biological materials around the world, the safety of the waste, strengthening of export control and border security and preventing the spread of WMD technologies among the terrorists and the countries involved in their distribution.

Incidentally in 2010, speaking at a summit on global nuclear security in Washington, President Nursultan Nazarbayev announced the initiative on the Universal Declaration of a Nuclear-Free World. According to Astana, the prohibition of nuclear weapons should be put at the forefront of future non-proliferation efforts.

Another significant initiative of Kazakhstan, in the light of current developments in recent years, was a proposal to create a Middle East zone free of nuclear weapons. Similar zones already exist in Latin America, Africa, Pacific and South-East Asia and unite more than 100 countries.

In essence, the proposal was a reflection of President Nazarbayev to answer the concerns of the international community, because now any country's intention to develop nuclear energy is considered "under a magnifying glass."

Iran is actively engaged in the construction of power plants and enrichment, which gives rise for concern in the West. The history of struggle with a terrifying myth of Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction is well known - the threat was imaginary. Drawing the lesson of this experience one should be careful in judging Iran’s nuclear program. Within the context of the establishment of an International Nuclear

Fuel Bank (MBYAT) under the auspices of the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) to provide an opportunity for countries who do not have sufficient internal resources to implement the entire nuclear fuel cycle, there would be an opportunity to turn to the bank.

Especially it will relieve them of the need to develop their own nuclear capabilities. Such a concentration in one place of all the necessary fuel for nuclear power, would eliminate the likelihood and the uncontrolled proliferation of nuclear materials and technologies, suggests the proposal.

The creation of such a bank will be an opportunity to North Korea, Iran or any other country of the "axis of evil". The bank can function without affecting the commercial nuclear fuel market and will enable countries to develop unhindered peaceful energy programs.

The proposal is especially significant in times of high energy cost. The idea of placing the nuclear bank (MBYAT) in Kazakhstan is supported by the United States. The country has not only the necessary infrastructure at the Semipalatinsk- former nuclear test site and ‘Ulbinsky’ metallurgy plant in the East.

Above all, Kazakhstan is the world's largest producer of uranium and has all the possibilities for the processing of highly enriched uranium to low enriched form.

Also today, the country has a tightly regulated legal framework that would ensure strict control over the export of nuclear and dual-use materials.

Kazakhstan has gained tremendous experience for the storage of nuclear fuel. Back in November of 2010 the country completed jointly with the United States and the IAEA project on transport and security of permanent storage of large quantities of nuclear fuel enough for about 800 nuclear bombs.

It is assumed that the final decision as to the Bank of Nuclear Fuel and at its location will be made in March this year in the anti-nuclear summit in Seoul.

U.S. Department of State

http://m.state.gov/md187647.htm

Remarks on the Conclusion of the 2012 Nuclear Security Summit

Ambassador Bonnie D. Jenkins April 6, 2012

…

I would like to highlight some of the major accomplishments we saw coming out of the Seoul Summit:

The United States, Russia and Kazakhstan unveiled the near competition of a joint project to eliminate remnants of past nuclear testing activities at a former nuclear test site.

More than a dozen weapons worth of nuclear material were removed from the area and are now safely secured.

We’re moving forward with Russia to eliminate enough plutonium for about 17,000 nuclear weapons and turn it instead into electricity.

Mexico and Ukraine have joined the ranks of nations that have removed all the highly enriched uranium from their territory.

The United States and several European partners announced an agreement to sustain the supply of necessary medical isotopes used to treat cancer and heart disease without the use of highly enriched uranium.

Three additional accomplishments made since the 2010 Summit include:

One, the extension of the G8 Global Partnership Against the Spread of Weapons and Materials of Mass Destruction;

Two, expanded membership of the Global Initiative to Combat Nuclear Terrorism; and

Three, the extension of UN Security Council Resolution 1540.

http://205.254.135.7/countries/country-data.cfm?fips=KZ

Country Analysis Brief ›

Kazakhstan has the second largest oil reserves as well as the second largest oil production among the former Soviet republics after Russia. The country also has large reserves of natural gas and production of both oil and gas is steadily increasing.

Kazakhstan is aiming to become one the world's top oil exporters in the next decade based on the development of 3 major oilfields.

With large amounts of associated natural gas in its oil fields, Kazakhstan is on the verge of being a net gas exporter.

Kazakhstan contains Central Asia’s largest recoverable coal reserves, and is the second largest coal producer in the Former Soviet Union after Russia.