Kazakhstan will seek to maintain its current alignment with Russia despite rising bilateral tensions, but Moscow's lack of levers to reverse its declining economic and political influence over Astana could eventually push Russia to threaten to use coercion -- or potentially even military action -- against the country. In the months since Russia's invasion of Ukraine, numerous events have suggested that the bilateral relationship between Russia and Kazakhstan is worsening. On March 6, a little over a week after Moscow launched its invasion, Kazakh officials approved a pro-Ukraine, anti-war rally in Almaty (Kazakhstan's largest city). Later that month, Kazakhstan then banned Russian military propaganda symbols in public, before canceling traditional May 9 Victory Day parades. At the St. Petersburg International Economic Forum in June, Kazakh President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev said that his country would not recognize the independence of Moscow's statelets in eastern Ukraine -- a stance furthered on Sept. 26...
