Detentions, cordon, blocked streets. March 1 in Kazakhstan

On the day of rallies announced by several opposition groups in Kazakh cities, dozens of people were detained. The approaches to the squares and akimat buildings were blocked.

Approaches to city and regional administration buildings blocked by mobile metal barriers. Reinforced police cordon. Blocked streets and squares. Internet disabled in places of possible rallies. So it has begun first day of spring 2020 in Kazakhstan.

Closer to noon on March 1, arrests began.

Police detained people on the approaches to places that several opposition groups announced as sites for holding rallies for the resignation of former Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev (he resigned as head of state in March 2019, but retained broad powers) and his inner circle from politics after the recent one death of civil activist Dulat Agadil in the capital's pre-trial detention center. After the news of the death of 43-year-old Agadil, mourning rallies and actions were held in several Kazakh cities, their participants said that they did not believe in the version of cardiac arrest, and believed that it was a murder for which the authorities were held responsible.

Azattyk's correspondents in Nur-Sultan reported that before their eyes on Sunday, 14 people were detained near the Abai monument, near the capital's administration. Some came out with posters «No to dictatorship. Old man, go away», «Down with the criminal Nazarbayev power!», «Dulat —victim of the system». The police detained one of the leaders of the Respublika movement, Bella Orynbetova, there.

In Almaty, the largest city in the country, near the Republic Square adjacent to the akimat, more than four dozen people were detained. Among those detained are — journalist Ermurat Bapi, head of an opposition newspaper «Dat».

In Shymkent, police pushed about 15 people who had gathered near the city administration building into paddy wagons.