In Search of a Welcoming Environment for Religions in the “New Kazakhstan”

Abstract

After experiencing first-hand the limitations of an exclusively activist, “name and shame” approach to advocating for religious freedom in Central Asia, I learned about a different, relational model of building religious freedom and covenantal pluralism, which was pioneered by the Institute for Global Engagement (IGE) in Southeast Asia. In this essay I tell the story of how my organization, Love Your Neighbor Community (LYNC), has applied the IGE model in Kazakhstan.

Keywords:

• covenantal pluralism
• religious freedom
• multi-faith relations
• cross-cultural religious literacy
• Central Asia

In this essay, I tell the story of how the organization I lead, Love Your Neighbor Community (LYNC), has helped to encourage progress toward religious freedom in Kazakhstan. We did so by applying lessons from the Institute for Global Engagement’s work in Vietnam and by creating multi-faith, multi-sectoral spaces in Kazakhstan for discussing “covenantal pluralism” and “cross-cultural religious literacy.”

The Kazakh Context

When Kazakhstan gained its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 its new government imposed few restrictions on religious believers. However, as time progressed, especially in the late 1990s and early 2000s, the government grew wary of religious groups perceived as “non-traditional” or potentially extremist. Given the country's proximity to Afghanistan and the wider Central Asian region's challenges with Islamist movements, concerns about radical Islam played a role in the government's increasing oversight and regulation of religious activities. In 2005 President Nursultan Nazarbayev signed a controversial law on countering extremism (Rotar 2005a) that increased state control over religious communities. Suppression of freedom of religion or belief (FoRB) increased. For instance, before 2005 a religious community was exempt from registration requirements and a religious association could be registered with as few as ten signatures, which was among the lowest registration thresholds in the former Soviet Union (Rotar 2005b). Under the new law, local religious groups had to have at least 50 adult citizen founders in order to apply for state registration, thereby restricting smaller communities (Corley 2019a).

The FoRB situation deteriorated further in 2011, when new successor laws established a complex four-tiered registration system. This regulatory system banned unregistered religious activity, imposed censorship on religious literature, and required religious groups to obtain both central and local government approval to build or open new places of worship. All registered religious organizations were forced to re-register under these strict new criteria or face closure (USCIRF 2012). With minor modifications, the same restrictive legal system remains in effect, preventing the full expression of FoRB.

This approach and set of laws are inconsistent, however, with the Kazakh Constitution, which bans discrimination on the basis of religion. The Constitution clearly states that:

The given Law is based on the fact that the Republic of Kazakhstan declares itself to be a democratic, secular state, confirms the right of everybody to the freedom of conscience, guarantees equal rights of every person regardless his/her religious opinion.¹

However, the reality is that government officials divide religious communities into those they tolerate, such as the Hanafi school of Islam, Jews, Catholics, Russian Orthodox, and small communities of Buddhists, and groups they label “sects,”² including independent Muslims, Ahmadis, most Protestants, Hare Krishna devotees, and Jehovah’s Witnesses.

While registered religious organizations may teach their faith to their members, only regionally and nationally registered religious organizations can train clergy in officially approved institutions (USCIRF 2012, 326). Regional registration requires at least two local organizations, each located within a different province, and a combined membership of at least 500 persons. National registration requires at least 5,000 total members and at least 300 members in each of the country’s 14 regions and the cities of Astana, Almaty, and Shymkent (U.S. Mission Kazakhstan 2022). Because of such requirement this law led to the closure of many religious organizations, police raids, detentions, and fines for those who could not meet this restriction. Kazakhstan’s onerous and complex registration requirements have led to a sharp drop in the number of registered religious groups, impacting both Muslim and Christian communities. It also unleashed a new level of suppression and persecution of religious minorities in Kazakhstan. For instance, the Nurdaulet Mosque was one of seven Islamic communities in Aktobe Region closed by the courts for failing to obtain the required re-registration. All were denied re-registration because they are independent of the Muslim Board (Corley 2013).

Some religious communities were subject to police surveillance, and criminal charges were regularly brought against a range of individuals for engaging in peaceful religious activity. In 2019, three self-exiled Protestant pastors were sentenced in absentia to long jail terms for leading New Life Pentecostal Church in Kazakhstan’s commercial capital Almaty. The pastors were variously accused of founding the Church in 1991 with “criminal intent” and “by means of the technology of psychological and psychotherapeutic influence with the aim of causing psychological harm to health.” At one point, the police accused the church of storing weapons. This charge was dropped as the only such item confiscated was an aerosol spray gun (Corley 2019b). The law has attracted strong criticism from civil society organizations, human rights defenders, and many religious communities in Kazakhstan, as well as from the United States Commission on International Religious Freedom (USCIRF) and the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE). USCIRF has urged the U.S. State Department to place Kazakhstan on the Special Watch List (SWL) for engaging in or tolerating severe violations of religious freedom (U.S. Department of State 2022).

Despite this restrictive legal framework, grassroots efforts have begun to develop, seeking reform that is consistent with the tolerant culture of Kazakhstan and with international norms. Such efforts seek to equip citizens with the knowledge and tools to build a cohesive society, effectively oppose religious radicalization, and advocate for the liberalization of religious life. This alternative approach aims to exercise religious freedom responsibly, shatter stereotypes, and create a strong, unified voice calling for changes to laws and policies on religion to bring them in line with international standards.

Beginning in 2018, Kazakhstan’s government became more receptive to this alternative approach. Officials realized that severe restrictions have angered peaceful religious communities and fueled corruption. In this essay I will recount how a series of educational conferences that I helped to organize have contributed to an easing of FoRB restrictions in Kazakhstan in recent years.

Building Religious Freedom through a Relational Approach

My advocacy for religious freedom in Kazakhstan stems from my own story. I was born in Minsk, Belarus, and have always cared deeply about issues of religious freedom and human rights, which were fiercely repressed by the Soviet regime. I left Belarus and entered the United States in 2000. After a brief period of relative religious freedom soon after the Soviet Union collapsed in 1991, the countries of Central Asia have become a hotbed for government-initiated religious persecution. Due to my familiarity with the culture, my ability to speak Russian, and my exposure to leading religious freedom practices in the United States and elsewhere, I saw an opportunity to promote religious freedom in the region.

Starting in 2010 I spearheaded multiple “name and shame” campaigns towards governments in multiple former Soviet countries. This confrontational style is a common strategy of human rights advocates and organizations. But “name and shame” strategies towards these governments consistently left a gap. The next step was elusive. There was no further strategy to stop the offenses from being repeated. One of the campaigns I organized was aimed at securing the release of a jailed pastor. The campaign was successful in terms of the release of this one pastor. However, due to the lack of change in the mindset of government officials, they resorted to altering their tactics and subsequently arrested a larger number of individuals.

While such campaigns can bring awareness to violations of religious freedom, they can also oversimplify complex issues and strain relationships with governments. With this in mind, I started the nonprofit Love Your Neighbor Community (LYNC) to help people practice their faith freely in the post-Soviet area.

Today LYNC collaborates with numerous thought leaders and experts in international religious freedom, including the Institute for Global Engagement (IGE),³ the International Religious Freedom (IRF) Secretariat,⁴ Brigham Young University Law School’s International Center for Law and Religion Studies,⁵ and Multi-Faith Neighbors Network (MFNN).⁶

In 2013, LYNC along with IGE, a Washington-based think tank, organized a conference in Kyrgyzstan and Kazakhstan on religion, security, and citizenship. This conference eschewed the traditional “name and shame” response to FoRB violations by focusing on case studies from Vietnam illustrating the success of the relational theory of change.

Learning from the IGE Model

A wide range of NGOs, as well as governmental actors including the US State Department, have for many years actively supported FoRB progress in Vietnam. IGE has made distinctive contributions to this wider movement in a variety of ways, but especially by conducting trainings introducing comparative perspectives⁷ and practices on religion and the rule of law. The programs have assisted religious leaders and government officials in perceiving what it means to be a good citizen, working together on national identity and unity, and allowing religious communities to play a more prominent role in Vietnam’s social/economic development.

By encouraging seminaries and other religious schools to participate in the trainings, cross sections of religious leaders have learned how to positively lead their communities to contribute to the common good of Vietnamese society. IGE and its partners have also deployed trained mediation teams of religious leaders and public officials to intervene and mediate conflicts at the local village level before they reach the national level.

IGE and its partners were able to facilitate pioneering meetings between Vietnamese Protestant church leaders, government officials, and religious scholars. This led to subsequent roundtables in 2011 and 2012. These roundtables began to mainstream the idea, among the government and general public, that Vietnamese Christians were good citizens and loved their country as much as anyone else. This momentum contributed to the establishment of the first Protestant seminary in North Vietnam in 2013.

The success in Vietnam was later replicated in Uzbekistan and achieved even more significant results under the 2018 Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) between IGE and the President of Uzbekistan’s Institute for Strategic and Regional Studies (ISRS). The MOU was based on a “religious freedom roadmap” developed together by both institutions. The U.S. Department of State removed Uzbekistan from the “Countries of Particular Concern” list in 2018. According to Secretary of State Mike Pompeo, the country had made “significant, concrete progress” toward laws and practices that promoted religious freedom.⁸

IGE’s partnerships in Central, South, and East Asia, assisted the organization in developing a simple theory of change, identifying four critical points of strategy to ensure change within the context of multiple societies. This 4S theory of change strategy has four steps:

1. Space: Through the invitation of local partners, develop a shared, safe space for people who would not otherwise meet.

2. Scholarship: Research the relevant issues, referencing examples outside an individual’s context and culture but within a politically-safe environment.

3. Standard of training/education: Understanding that education changes mindsets, resulting in changed behavior, we provide training and education that equips leaders on all levels to make decisions for themselves within their context.

4. Structure of change: Encourage graduates of the training and education programs to return to their professions across countries and regions linked to like-minded peers, equipped to advocate for change within their contexts.⁹

The IGE trainings demonstrated that the objective of the roundtables, gaining the respect and trust of the participants, was achieved by what transpired between meetings. This can be conveyed concisely by stating that the process is the product. First, relationships are built, which over time establish trust. Then, out of trust comes opportunities, which, when backed by informed and educated members of society and state, cultivate change. Change, in turn, is only sustainable when it is socially owned from the bottom-up (civil society) and legally protected from the top-down (government) (Seiple 2014).

Applying the Model in Kazakhstan

For the first time in 2014, LYNC used this theory of change to positively engage Kazakhstan. However, it took five more years and multiple visits to build an extensive cross-sectoral network in Kazakhstan. We did so by organizing and participating in hundreds of discussions and many roundtables on religious issues that included governmental, academic, and civil society leaders from all over Kazakhstan.

In 2018 LYNC participated in the first religious freedom ministerial in Washington, DC, and invited officials from Kazakhstan’s Committee for Religious Affairs (CRA) for an event organized on the margins by LYNC. The Kazakhstan government responded positively when it heard from LYNC partners who gave reports, demonstrated solution models, and shared their intentions toward Kazakhstan.

Because of this long-term relational engagement, Kazakhstan’s government realized that LYNC was genuinely interested in building religious freedom and helping it negotiate this path—within Kazakhstan and with the international community. Since then, the Kazakh government has granted all requests to assist with event organization and to engage government employees who work on religious affairs in the country. Perhaps the greatest indicator of Kazakhstan’s government being amenable to the partnership was that it issued special permission and a visa to LYNC representatives during the national COVID lockdown. Between 2020 and 2022 LYNC conducted 36 meetings in Kazakhstan (with appropriate health protocols). This qualitative metric indicated the good relations and willingness to move forward.

The trust and relationship building with the government and civil society culminated in the 2019 LYNC-organized roundtables where the idea of “covenantal pluralism” was introduced in Kazakhstan. As W. Christopher Stewart, Chris Seiple, and Dennis R. Hoover (2020) define it,

covenantal pluralism is characterized both by a constitutional order of equal rights and responsibilities and by a culture of reciprocal commitment to engaging, respecting, and protecting the other—albeit without necessarily conceding equal veracity or moral equivalence to the beliefs and behaviors of others.

Stewart, Seiple, and Hoover also specify three sets of enabling conditions that are essential for a society to achieve a sustainable environment of covenantal pluralism: (1) FoRB, (2) cross-cultural religious literacy, and (3) character virtues exercised in respectful engagement across lines of deep religious/worldview difference (e.g. humility, patience, and empathy).

Covenantal pluralism entails a framework for understanding and promoting religious diversity and coexistence within a society. The term “covenant” refers to a mutual agreement or understanding between different religious groups, based on the principles of respect, tolerance, and cooperation. Under a covenantal pluralism approach, society recognizes and respects the different religious traditions and beliefs of its members and promotes an environment where these beliefs can be freely practiced and expressed. At the same time, all religious and secular groups are expected to abide by certain shared values, such as respect for human rights, non-violence, and the rule of law. Covenantal pluralism emphasizes the importance of building relationships between different religious groups, fostering mutual understanding and dialogue, and working together towards common goals, such as promoting social justice or addressing shared challenges.

LYNC embraced covenantal pluralism as its primary engagement paradigm, which in practice is helping a state and society recover and restore the best of who they already are, through a concept that also helps them deal practically with their challenges—from extremism to corruption to ethnic divides. In other words, by providing a framework that reminds them of who they are, LYNC creates a catalyst that serves everyone’s (enlightened) self-interest, beginning with the possibility of a cohesive society.

The first phase of the 2019 LYNC/Kazakhstan engagement included exploring opportunities to come together, learning about the Kazakhstan’s government, and gauging civil society reaction to covenantal pluralism as a means to build religious freedom. Survey evaluations showed overwhelming support for the initial phase of programming.

The beginnings of covenantal pluralism could be seen in Kazakhstan. After the first multi-faith retreat in 2021, which brought together regional heads of the CRA along with imams and pastors from across the country, a group of evangelical pastors from various regions visited a city where the local church had previously been subject to governmental strictures. The government had banned meetings and the pastor had been fined multiple times for “illegal religious activities.” The visiting group rented a hall in one of the hotels at their own risk and held a service there. The following day, they were summoned to the mayor’s office and were expected to be fined for holding a religious event outside the designated facility. But instead of fining them, the mayor thanked them for visiting the city and emphasized the significance of interfaith harmony and relationships.

Widespread support came in the form of encouragement and endorsement by Kazakhstan’s ambassador to the United States and the Ministry of Information and Social Development. Additionally, the Ministry recognized the participation of non-registered religious minorities (e.g. Ahmadi Muslims, the Krishna society, and Scientologists) by issuing invitations to them to participate at the 2019 religious freedom roundtable. The government acknowledged in later conversations that they need to begin official recognition of some unregistered religious minority groups, and the roundtables are a useful way to engage those groups publicly.

The 2019 LYNC/Kazakhstan engagement had three key successes. First, through international experts, LYNC invited roundtable speakers active in advancing religious freedom in the world, including IGE vice president James Chen, Multi-Faith Neighbor Network (MFNN) co-founders Pastor Bob Roberts and Imam Mohamed Magid, and International Religious Freedom Roundtable co-chair Greg Mitchell. They presented the American experience and model of mutual engagement, and the 80 Kazakh multi-sectoral stakeholders attending the event asked questions and discussed what aspects were relevant to their context. The local imams expressed their willingness to engage in post-roundtable dialogue. The local evangelical pastors were invited to share a meal in the local mosque and were accepted with respectful listening by the Muslim leaders. Event questionnaires showed overwhelming support for continued implementation of the LYNC-Kazakhstan relationship.¹⁰

A significant milestone was reached on February 27, 2020, when LYNC hosted the concluding roundtable in Nur-Sultan. Representatives from the three previous roundtable locations—Shymkent, Ust-Kamenogorsk, and Aktobe—were in attendance as well as government ministers, religious leaders, and other high-ranking figures based in the capital. Participants actively discussed what needed to be included in the draft Memorandum of Understanding (MOU) based on their respective professional experience, the expert models shared at the roundtables, and the next steps needed to create an effective path to advance religious freedom.

On July 14, 2021, LYNC signed a strategic MOU with the Government of Kazakhstan signaling a new era of building religious freedom in Central Asia. The historic MOU signing ceremony was held during the first-ever International Religious Freedom (IRF) Summit,¹¹ which took place July 13–15, 2021 in Washington, DC. Witnessed by members of the United States and Kazakhstan governments, religious and civil society leaders, and members of the press, the MOU is the first of its kind between an American non-profit organization and the Kazakhstan government.

It was a day for celebrating developments of the past eleven years and the commitment of the Government of Kazakhstan to elevate itself as a leader in building religious freedom. This signing is a testament to a multi-year, multi-entity commitment to cultivating a framework that integrates the tenets of geopolitical discernment, respect for culture, and recognition of government and grassroots progress.

Building on this progress, in January of 2023 LYNC signed a new MOU with Caspian University located in Almaty, Kazakhstan aimed at deepening the impact of its programs. The MOU seeks to develop a curriculum and syllabus for an advanced training program in cross-cultural religious literacy, primarily targeted towards government employees and law enforcement officials involved in religious affairs. To address the unique challenges of post-Soviet developments in the religious field, LYNC will partner with Pepperdine University’s Straus Institute for Dispute Resolutions in the development of the training. This partnership represents an important step forward in advancing religious freedom through the promotion of mutual understanding and cooperation among individuals of different faiths and sectors of the society.

Paradigm Shifting: Liberalization of Kazakhstan’s Religious Life

I admit that we were only focused on ourselves and saw only ourselves, but we live on this Earth, and the world around us is vast, and now our paradigm is being changed. We are developing new, higher, and wider relationships, which are already yielding positive results for our communities.

—Ivan Kryukov, New Life Pentecostal Bishop, Kazakhstan

Kazakhstan has experienced several terrorist attacks throughout the past decade. For instance, On June 5, 2016, militants in the western city of Aktobe stormed a gun store and attempted to break into the armory at the National Guard barracks. The government said the attackers killed five civilians and three members of the National Guard. On July 18, a lone gunman attacked a police station in Almaty and a nearby office of the Committee on National Security (KNB), Kazakhstan’s main security and intelligence agency, killing eight law enforcement officials and two civilians (U.S. Department of State 2016).

Numerous interviews and case studies conducted by LYNC throughout Kazakhstan have revealed that the government’s primary concern is to stop radicalization, which threatens to spiral out of control and significantly compromise public safety. The majority Muslim community is concerned about radicalization as well as Islam’s declining popularity among the youth, who have access to a variety of religious teachings via social media. In many instances, they do not wish to submit to the traditional teaching of Sunni Islam. Because of its previous success, the Kazakhstan government is willing to take advantage of the opportunity provided by covenantal pluralism to devise a solution to problems of radicalization and violence.

LYNC started by bringing together imams with Christian pastors who converted from Islam but belong to the same ethnic group. This is one of the most delicate situations for fostering relationships across religious faiths, and the process is not always easy. An imam and a pastor from the same small town got into an argument at one of the multi-faith retreats, and the imam accused the pastor of apostasy and betraying his faith. An imam-trainer interjected by asking questions, providing theological insight, and offering suggestions for the troubled situation of the newly established church. By the end of this conversation, the imam-trainer said, “It feels like I’m planting a church for the first time in my life, and I like it!” The multi-faith retreats serve as an effective tool for stereotype-breaking. By allowing space for the development of relationships on a human level, covenantal pluralism facilitates this process without jeopardizing the fundamental beliefs and theologies of various religious groups. An imam at one of the retreats stood up and said, “I have never seen how a Baptist laughs before! I thought that they are very angry people.”

The impact of multi-faith relationship-building retreats continues to affect local relationships, bringing changes to local communities. Pastor Vasiliy and Imam Talgat, who didn’t know each other, both attended the retreat in 2021, and met again at the Karaganda mosque one month later. The pastor was aware that it was the imam’s birthday, and he wished to surprise him with books and a brand-new Bible. Following the pastor’s greeting to the imam, they both participated in the service. The pastor quietly observed the service and prayed by himself. After the pleasant conversation, they agreed to meet again and engage their respective congregations.

Religious minority leaders from the cities, where covenantal pluralism was introduced through various engagements, report improved relations with the government and a greater degree of appreciation for their communities from both the government and the religious majority. One of the pastors from a city where the religious minorities were being persecuted said: “We were invited to the multi-faith events before, but never received the chance to speak and usually sat in the last row. Now, we have a chance to speak on an equal basis with the imams and Orthodox priests.”

Conversations and action steps taken by the government present a willingness and enthusiasm for continued engagement in covenantal pluralism. The CRA sent 16 department heads from 16 regions to observe the multi-faith training in Burabay in 2021. These graduates now understand covenantal pluralism experientially and are poised to be positive voices for future implementation in their cities, continuing the building of religious freedom from both the top-down and bottom-up. The head of the Almaty CRA regional office, Nurlan Kikimov, said,

It is a natural and very interesting approach in the building of multi-faith relationships. Our colleagues who attended the event keep talking about it. I hope you will continue what you started and will be able to integrate it into our local context all over the country.

Another covenantal pluralism tenet making headway in Kazakhstan is cross-cultural religious literacy (CCRL). Chris Seiple and Dennis Hoover (2021) define it as a set of skills (evaluation, negotiation, and communication) rooted in a set of competencies (in understanding oneself, understanding the religious “other,” and understanding the context of potential collaboration). These competencies and skills contribute to, and are refined by, practical experiences of mutual engagement, embodied and lived in specific contexts.

This CCRL training program started in March of 2022 and marked a series of notable firsts. This was the first time a training program on religion had ever been held involving local law enforcement agencies, religious communities, and international organizations. This was the first time the government, an international NGO, and a local civil society organization partnered to deliver a religious freedom certificate training on religious literacy. Finally, for the first time, a local Muslim imam and Christian pastor co-moderated each session of the certificate course, serving as an ideal model for constructive engagement and relationship-building that could be replicated in other regions of the country and beyond. One Kazakh prosecutor said of the program, “This is a very interesting approach—to share different case studies from around the world instead of telling us what to do. I would like to see how a broader religious literacy program could work in our country.”

The LYNC-Kazahkstan engagement gave birth to a model in Central Asia that differs from the traditional approach to advocacy for religious freedom. By “traditional” I mean an approach wherein an international organization hosts a roundtable discussion for religious and government leaders across the country in an attempt to gather recommendations for the government on how to reform the law. It’s been done before many times, and such an approach has three main flaws. First, religious leaders in Kazakhstan used to attend such events, but it had little significance for them. If the event was held at a nice hotel and tasty food was served, they would come. Then they would discuss various issues within their own groups. Second, the religious leaders present at the roundtable frequently focused only on themselves and their issues and were unwilling to support one another and a common cause. Third, the religious leaders frequently lacked the knowledge necessary to make recommendations for legal reform. I took part in a lot of these roundtable discussions where we talked about local issues like who put the fence in the wrong place. Without a doubt, discussing and occasionally resolving local issues is beneficial, but it does not lead to recommendations for policy reform.

LYNC’s model provides a proven solution to these issues and unites Kazakhstan’s religious communities and civil society in reform advocacy. First, we work on multi-faith relationship building that creates a real friendship between religious leaders of different faiths. Such relationships create capacity for religious leaders to defend each other and achieve common goals. Second, we educate government employees and law enforcement involved in religious affairs as well as religious leaders through CCRL trainings and Religion and the Rule of Law seminars. Such education fosters an ability to discuss current religious legislation in the spirit of mutual respect and understanding and to provide thoughtful recommendations. Third, we set up a roundtable discussion only after the group of government, civil society, and religious community leaders have established relationships and taken educational programs and were equipped to hold the constructive and cooperative multi-faith engagement necessary to drive reforms forward. Participants also work alongside legal scholars to review and provide feedback and recommendations on reforms.

Conclusion

In this essay I have emphasized the importance of a relational approach and the covenantal pluralism framework in achieving sustainable change in religious freedom conditions. The successes of IGE and its partners in Vietnam and Uzbekistan, as well as the efforts of Love Your Neighbor Community (LYNC) in Kazakhstan, demonstrate the effectiveness of this approach. By building relationships, trust, and social ownership, LYNC’s work provides a proven solution to unite Kazakhstan’s religious communities and civil society in reform advocacy within the country. The government’s willingness to engage in covenantal pluralism presents an opportunity to devise solutions to issues of security and religious freedom. Overall, LYNC’s model creates an opportunity to resolve many of the issues in Kazakhstan and advance religious freedom while expanding social cohesion and countering violent extremism.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

Wade Kusack

Wade Kusack is a founder and the CEO of Love Your Neighbor Community (LYNC), an NGO based in Florida. He brings over a decade of expertise in religious studies to government, academic, and civil society platforms. He develops educational networks for religious, civil society, and government leaders in Eurasia and Central Asia on cross-cultural religious literacy as well as international and domestic religious laws and policies. He has professional fluency in English and Russian. Email: [email protected]

Notes

1 See https://www.legislationline.org/download/id/4091/file/Kazakhstan_Law_religious_freedoms_organisations_2011_en.pdf.

2 The term “sect” has a pejorative connotation in Russian and Kazakh as it often does in English.

3 See https://globalengage.org/.

4 https://www.irfroundtable.org/.

5 See https://www.iclrs.org/.

6 See https://mfnn.org/.

7 See https://globalengage.org/updates/view/ige-visits-vietnam-and-laos.

8 See https://globalengage.org/updates/view/state-department-removes-uzbekistan-from-special-watch-list-for-religious-freedom-violations.

9 See https://globalengage.org/updates/view/ige-shares-about-religious-freedom-work-with-kazakhstan-government-officials.

10 See https://lyncommunity-my.sharepoint.com/:b:/g/personal/wade_lyncommunity_org/Efh83T3Yr7RBtmWjcGv7cUwBy1C6glYxXho7iOyhfs1aVA?e=JgbVoG.

11 See https://irfsummit.org/.