ASTANA, Kazakhstan (RFE/RL) — Armenia’s foreign minister, national police chief and human rights ombudsman have spoken with their Kazakh counterparts by phone on Monday, January 7, following anti-Armenian protests sparked by the murder of a young man in Kazakhstan.
The Kazakh man was stabbed to death in a clash between two groups of youths, one of which consisted of ethnic Armenians, during celebrations of New Year on January 1. Three other men were hospitalized with stab wounds.
The brawl broke out in a restaurant in the central Kazakh city of Qaraghandy in the early hours of 2019.
Local police said they arrested two ethnic Armenian men and are hunting for another in connection with the violence.
On Sunday, some 200 protesters gathered in front of Qaraghandy’s regional police department and demanded thorough investigations into the killing. Some of them demanded that Armenians be deported from the country.
The Qaraghandy regional governor, Erlan Qoshanov, met with the protesters and said that “all those responsible for the death will be prosecuted.” “I promise you … that the main suspect, who remains at large, will be detained in two-three days,” Qoshanov said.
