By Felix Light and Tamara Vaal
ASTANA, Aug 31 (Reuters) – Kazakhstan’s President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev on Monday appointed Erlan Karin, a longtime adviser, as vice president, an office created under a new constitution that Central Asia’s largest economy adopted earlier this year.
The move makes Karin, a close adviser to Tokayev since he took over the presidency in 2019, first in line to succeed his boss as the leader of Kazakhstan, an energy and minerals giant that maintains warm ties with Russia, the West and China.
Tokayev, 73, is eligible to run for another seven-year term as president under the new constitution, Kazakhstan’s supreme court has said. His current term ends in 2029.
Kazakh presidents are otherwise limited to a single term in office under the basic law.
Karin, 50, has a background in counter-terrorism and has served as a top adviser to Tokayev since 2019. He has positioned himself as a key figure in promoting Tokayev’s ideology, which he has dubbed “New Kazakhstan”.
Tokayev also proposed to reappoint Olzhas Bektenov as the country’s prime minister, a position he has held since 2024.
Both appointments were swiftly approved by the country’s parliament, which is dominated by the pro-Tokayev Adilet party.
Tokayev, a former Soviet diplomat and top United Nations official, took office as the chosen successor of Nursultan Nazarbayev, Kazakhstan’s founding president, who ruled from 1991 to 2019.
Tokayev broke from his predecessor, whom he had served as prime minister and foreign minister, in 2022 after a bout of nationwide unrest that left hundreds dead and which he cast as a coup attempt by Nazarbayev-era figures.
(Reporting by Tamara Vaal and Felix Light; Editing by Gleb Bryanski and Jamie Freed)
