50 Fun Facts About Kazakhstan

What is the capital of Kazakhstan?

The city on the Ishim river has also been called Akmolinsk, Tselinograd, Aqmola and, from 2019 to 2022, Nur-Sultan.

Which city was Kazakhstan's capital until 1997 and remains its largest?

It sits in the foothills of the Trans-Ili Alatau near the Kyrgyz border and has more than two million residents.

From 2019 to 2022 Kazakhstan's capital bore what name, in honour of the first president?

President Tokayev's first official act was the renaming; it was reversed in September 2022 after the January unrest.

Kazakhstan is the world's largest landlocked country and ranks where overall by land area?

At about 2.7 million km2 it is roughly the size of Western Europe, with fewer than 8 people per square kilometre.

Kazakhstan and which other country are the only landlocked states with territory in two continents?

The Ural River, which crosses western Kazakhstan, is taken as the dividing line between Europe and Asia.

Which mountain on the China–Kyrgyzstan–Kazakhstan tripoint is Kazakhstan's highest point?

Its rock summit is 6,995 m, but the icecap pushes it past 7,000 m, so climbers count it as a 7,000-metre peak.

The Karagiye trench, Kazakhstan's lowest point, lies roughly how far below sea level?

Its name means "Black Jaw", and it is the lowest point in all of Central Asia and the former Soviet Union.

Lake Balkhash in southeastern Kazakhstan is unusual because of what?

The shallow western part is fresh and the deeper eastern part salty; the Ili river supplies most of the inflow.

The Aral Sea, once the world's fourth-largest lake, had shrunk to what share of its original size by 2007?

Soviet irrigation projects diverted the rivers that fed it from the 1960s, in one of the world's worst environmental disasters.

The great grassland plain covering a third of Kazakhstan holds what world record?

It covers about 804,500 km2 of grassland and sandy country.

The Botai culture of Kazakhstan, from 3700–3100 BC, is credited with what first?

The steppes are also the ancestral home of the wild apple Malus sieversii, the main ancestor of every domestic apple.

Which nomadic Iranian people, with the Massagetae and Scythians, dominated ancient Kazakhstan?

Turkic nomads only entered the region from the sixth century, gradually replacing the Iranian-speaking population.

Which empire subjugated the territory of Kazakhstan in the 13th century?

Khwarazm's clash with Genghis Khan in 1218 brought the conquest; the Golden Horde later ruled the steppe.

The Kazakh Khanate was founded after the 15th-century break-up of which Mongol successor state?

Kazakh oral tradition treats that state as its own, and Jani Beg's 14th-century reign as its golden age.

By the 18th century the Kazakh Khanate had split into how many jüz, or hordes?

The Senior, Middle and Junior hordes were absorbed one by one by the Russian Empire during the 18th and 19th centuries.

Which Kazakh leader proclaimed himself khan in 1837 and fought Russian rule until his death in 1847?

His struggle even echoed in Jules Verne's 1876 novel Michael Strogoff.

Roughly what proportion of all ethnic Kazakhs died in the Soviet famine of 1930–1933?

Between 1.3 and 2.3 million people perished, the highest share of any ethnic group in the early-1930s Soviet famines.

Kazakhstan became a full union republic of the USSR in which year?

It had been an autonomous republic inside the Russian SFSR since 1920, with its first centre in Russian-populated Orenburg.

The USSR's first nuclear bomb test in 1949 took place at a site near which Kazakh town?

The town is now Semey; the anti-nuclear movement born there became a major political force in the late 1980s.

How many nuclear tests did the Soviet Union carry out at its Kazakh test site between 1949 and 1989?

That was about a quarter of all nuclear tests in history; the site closed in 1991.

Yuri Gagarin's Vostok 1 was launched in April 1961 from which site in Kazakhstan?

The Soviet shuttle Buran and the Mir space station also flew from there, and all Russian crewed launches still do.

Russia leases its main cosmodrome from Kazakhstan until which year?

The lease covers about 6,000 km2, and the city of Baikonur has special administrative status because of it.

The December 1986 Jeltoqsan riots protested the local party boss's replacement by which Russian?

Young Kazakhs objected to Dinmukhamed Konayev being replaced by an outsider from the Russian SFSR.

Where did Kazakhstan stand in the order of Soviet republics declaring independence in 1991?

The declaration followed the failed August 1991 coup in Moscow.

Who was Kazakhstan's first president, in power from independence until 2019?

He resigned on 19 March 2019 after nearly three decades and was stripped of his Security Council post during the January 2022 unrest.

Who succeeded Nazarbayev as president of Kazakhstan in 2019?

He took office on 12 June 2019 and consolidated power after the January 2022 protests over fuel prices.

Into how many regions is Kazakhstan divided?

Almaty, Astana and Shymkent are cities of republican significance outside the regions, and Baikonur has special status too.

What is the currency of Kazakhstan?

It was introduced by decree in November 1993 after the rouble zone collapsed and is divided into 100 tiyn.

What bird soars beneath the sun on Kazakhstan's turquoise flag?

The gold sun above it has 32 rays, and the hoist carries a national ornament called qoshqar-muiz.

How many rays does the sun on the flag of Kazakhstan have?

They represent the 32 ethnicities of the Turkic people; the flag was adopted on 4 June 1992.

Kazakhstan's national drink kumys is made from what?

A traditional dinner runs through appetisers, soup and mains such as pilaf and beshbarmak.

The name of the Central Asian dish beshbarmak literally means what?

It refers to eating the meat, noodles and onion broth with one's hands.

Kazakh is part of which language family?

It belongs to the Kipchak sub-branch, and the government announced in 2015 that Latin script would replace Cyrillic by 2025.

In 2015 Kazakhstan announced its language would switch from Cyrillic to which alphabet by 2025?

The Kazakh name of the country in the new script is Qazaqstan.

What is the largest religion in Kazakhstan?

About a quarter of the population is Russian Orthodox, and Orthodox Christmas is a national holiday.

Who commissioned the Mausoleum of Khoja Ahmed Yasawi in Turkestan, Kazakhstan's first World Heritage Site, in 1389?

It was left unfinished when he died in 1405 and became a pilgrimage centre; UNESCO listed it in 2003.

Khan Shatyr, a giant transparent tent in the capital, was designed by which British architect?

The 150-m tent covers an area bigger than ten football pitches; he also designed the city's glass Palace of Peace and Reconciliation.

Kazakhstan produces about 60% of the GDP of Central Asia, mainly thanks to which industry?

The Tengiz and Kashagan fields each hold billions of barrels; Chevron leads the Tengiz venture.

Kazakhstan is estimated to have the world's second-largest reserves of which nuclear fuel metal?

It also ranks second for chromium, lead and zinc, third for manganese and fifth for copper.

Which Kazakh boxer held the WBA, WBC, IBF and IBO middleweight titles?

Kazakhstan's boxers have consistently ranked among the top Olympic medal-winners behind only Cuba and Russia.

Olga Rypakova won Olympic gold for Kazakhstan in 2012 in which event?

She had taken silver at the 2011 World Championships the year before.

Barys, the top ice-hockey club from Kazakhstan's capital, has played since 2008–09 in which league?

It moved there for the 2008–09 season; NHL goalie Evgeni Nabokov is among the country's best-known players.

Kazakhstan's largest city bid unsuccessfully to host the Winter Olympics of which two years?

The city's Medeu rink and Shymbulak resort sit in the mountains just above it.

How many UNESCO World Heritage sites does Kazakhstan have?

Three are cultural and two natural, including the Yasawi mausoleum and stretches of the Silk Roads.

The Kazakh government later used the 2006 mockumentary Borat for what?

The government had denounced the film at first, and it was banned in almost every Arab country except Lebanon.

A disputed theory says the name of Kazakhstan's largest city derives from the Kazakh word for which fruit?

The wild apple Malus sieversii, ancestor of the domestic apple, is native to the region and now listed as vulnerable.

The Charyn Canyon, 80 km long in the northern Tian Shan, cuts through a plateau of what rock?

It runs along the Charyn River gorge in the northern Tian Shan, the "Heavenly Mountains".

Which city joined Almaty and Astana as a 'city of republican significance' in June 2018?

The three cities sit outside Kazakhstan's regions, and Baikonur has special status too because it is leased to Russia.

What is the title of the major work of 19th-century Kazakh poet Abai Qunanbaiuly?

The philosophical treatise and poem collection helped preserve Kazakh folk culture and criticised Russian colonial policy.

In which year did Kazakhstan join the World Trade Organization?

Its central position on the new Silk Road makes trade a pillar of the economy alongside oil, gas and uranium.