Policy

The Republic of Kazakhstan has not acceded to the Mine Ban Treaty. It has expressed support for the treaty’s humanitarian objectives, but cited the need for antipersonnel mines to protect its border and the perceived need for alternatives as the reasons it has not yet joined.[1]

On 5 December 2018, Kazakhstan voted in favor of UN General Assembly (UNGA) Resolution 73/61, calling for universalization and full implementation of the Mine Ban Treaty, as it has every year since 2007.[2]

Kazakhstan has not been a regular participant in landmine meetings in the past, attending as an observer the Mine Ban Treaty Second Review Conference in November–December 2009 and the Fourteenth Meeting of States Parties in 2014. It did not make any formal remarks at these meetings. It also attended the Dushanbe Workshop on Achieving a Mine-Free Central Asia in July 2009 and the Conference on Facilitating Central Asia Regional Cooperation in Mine Action in Dushanbe in November 2009.[3]

Kazakhstan joined the Convention on Conventional Weapons on 8 July 2009, but is not party to Amended Protocol II on landmines or Protocol V on Explosive Remnants of War. Kazakhstan is also not party to the Convention on Cluster Munitions.

Production, transfer, stockpiling, use

Kazakhstan has stated that it is not a producer of antipersonnel mines. It has had a moratorium of unlimited duration on the export and transit of landmines in place since 1997.[4]

The size of Kazakhstan’s antipersonnel mine stockpile is not known, but a 1998 media report estimated that the government had between 800,000 and one million antipersonnel mines.[5] Officials have said that many of the mines have expired, that some have been destroyed in recent years, and that a plan for further destruction is in place.[6]

Government officials have at times acknowledged the use of landmines in border areas and at other times denied the existence of minefields in Kazakhstan.[7]