When Donald Trump and Kassym-Jomart Tokayev got on the phone on July 10, their conversation ranged from the implementation of billions of dollars in commercial agreements to nuclear nonproliferation to an invitation for the American president to visit the Kazakh steppe. What was striking was not any single item but the routineness of the exchange. A US president and a Central Asian leader now talk the way close partners do—and that is new.
Consider the past eight months. Tokayev traveled to Washington in November for the first C5+1 summit ever held at the White House, where Trump announced Kazakhstan’s accession to the Abraham Accords—the initial addition of his second term. Companies from the two countries concluded 29 agreements valued around $17 billion. Trump has since extended G20 invitations to Kazakhstan and Uzbekistan for the Miami summit. A procession of senior Americans has passed through Astana this year, including Senator Steve Daines (R-MT), Special Envoy Sergio Gor, and a delegation from the US Chamber of Commerce. Cumulative American investment in Kazakhstan now exceeds $100 billion, and may rise to $137 billion in the medium term.
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Joseph Epstein is Director of the Turan Research Center.