Kazakhstan

April 19, 2008 -- HOUSTON – NASA astronaut Peggy Whitson, the first female commander of the International Space Station, returned to Earth at approximately 4:30 a.m. EDT Saturday, ending a mission during which she conducted five spacewalks and set a new record in American spaceflight.

Unpiloted Progress supply vehicle on its way to dock with the International Space Station: Photo by NASA    » read more »

December 13, 2007 -- The United States of America and the Republic of Kazakhstan finalized an extension amendment to their bilateral Cooperative Threat Reduction (CTR) Agreement today. The amendment was signed by U.S. Secretary of Defense Robert M. Gates and by Ambassador of the Republic of Kazakhstan Erlan Idrissov. This CTR agreement, first signed in 1993 by Kazakhstan’s President Nursultan Nazarbayev and then U.S. Vice President Al Gore, formed the foundation upon which our two governments built a strategic partnership against the threat of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).    » read more »

Washington, D.C. -- September 21, 2007 -- Freedom House, together with six of the U.S.’s most prominent human rights organizations, issued a letter today to Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, urging her to strongly oppose a bid by Kazakhstan to chair the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE) in 2009.    » read more »

10 May 2007 -- The presidents of Russia and Kazakhstan have signed an agreement to create a joint uranium enrichment center.

The accord was among several signed Thursday during talks between Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and his visiting Russian counterpart, Vladimir Putin, in the Kazakh capital, Astana. Officials say products from the center will be available to other nations for use in generating energy.

Mr. Putin described the center, to be located in Siberia, as the first step in creating a "global nuclear energy infrastructure."    » read more »

WASHINGTON, May 3, 2007 — The World Bank has agreed to assist the governments of Kazakhstan, the United States and Switzerland in setting up an independent foundation in Kazakhstan that will use approximately $84 million in frozen funds for development projects involving poor children and youth in the Central Asian country. The World Bank support is described in an agreement filed earlier today in court in New York under which the three governments agree to a mechanism to release the funds to support activities aimed at improving child and youth welfare.    » read more »