Ambassador of Kazakhstan to the United States Yerzhan Ashikbayev participated in a webinar “30 Years after the Closure of the Semipalatinsk Test Site: U.S.-Kazakhstan Cooperation to Reduce the Nuclear Threat”, Delovoy Kazakhstan reports.
The virtual event was hosted by the Caspian Policy Center on the occasion of the 30th anniversary of the Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site closure and the International Day against Nuclear Tests.
Ambassador Ashikbayev during his remarks underscored that with the will of the people of Kazakhstan and the bold decision by the First President of Kazakhstan Nursultan Nazarbayev to close the nuclear test site and voluntarily renouncing the world's fourth largest nuclear arsenal, Kazakhstan greatly contributed to the strengthening of the WMD nonproliferation regime. Ambassador emphasized that Kazakhstan-U.S. cooperation in nuclear threat reduction proved to be one of the most prominent success stories.
Among the webinar panelists were Director General of Kazakhstan's National Nuclear Center Erlan Batyrbekov, Executive Director of the Caspian Policy Center Efgan Nifti, Senior fellow at the Council on Strategic Risks and Former Assistant Secretary of Defense Andrew Weber, Former U.S. Ambassador to Kazakhstan Richard Hoagland, Senior Fellow of the Nuclear Threat Initiative Leon Ratz.
Participants commended Kazakhstan's efforts and expressed support for the adoption of concrete measures to maintain a global moratorium on nuclear testing.
