Russians appraise Kazakhstan's OSCE chairmanship positively

ST.PETERSBURG. November 30. KAZINFORM /Yelena Myagkova/ On the eve of the OSCE Summit in Astana the Russian Public Opinion Research Center presented report on how Russians and CIS citizens appraise the achievements of Kazakhstan as the Organization presiding country in 2010.

Respondents recognize the promotion of Dmitry Medvedev's initiative on reforming the European security system as the main achievement of Kazakhstan (34%).

Prevention of escalation of the unrest in Kyrgyzstan into large-scale hostilities (30%), assistance in settling protracted conflicts (26%), promotion of the CIS countries role in the OSCE (25%), combining European and Asian security models (24%), recognition of the interethnic tolerance issue as one of the main directions of the OSCE activity (21%) are the most significant success as well.

Speaking of the results of interstate research in the CIS, the opinion on the most significant achievements of Kazakhstan differs here. Belarusians placed on top the prevention of escalation of the unrest in Kyrgyzstan into large-scale hostilities (44%), Armenians and Azerbaijanis appreciated the most assistance in settling protracted conflicts (54 and 72% respectively).

Taking into account the fact that the research was held on the eve of the OSCE Summit in Astana, the esteems of this event seemed quite restrained: 12% of Russians recognized the holding of the Summit after 11-year hiatus as an important event. The rate of such respondents in Armenia is 16%, in Belarus - 11%, in Azerbaijan - 9%.