Kazakh President Qasym-Zhomart Toqaev said in a statement that police and the national guard have the situation under control. He ordered the government to take steps to maintain calm in the villages.
RFE/RL Kazakh Service correspondents reached one of the impacted villages, Masanchi, where they reported many shops had been vandalized and torched in the unrest.
(Watch a Facebook live stream from Masanchi by RFE/RL’s Kazakh Service.)
RFE/RL broadcast video showing a cordon of riot police equipped with shields deployed along a road leading into Masanchi.
At a press conference in Nur-Sultan, Turghymbaev said 47 people had been arrested. He said 30 homes, 15 shops, and 20 cars had been damaged in the violence.
The area where the clashes took place is home to many members of the Dungan minority group, Muslims of Chinese ethnic origin.
It is unclear what sparked the violence.
Toqaev urged a thorough investigation and instructed security agencies to prosecute those spreading ethnic hate speech, “provocative rumors and disinformation.”
With reporting by Reuters
Radio Free | Radio Free (2020-02-08T05:37:22+00:00) Eight Killed, 40 Injured In Village Clashes In Kazakhstan. Retrieved from https://www.radiofree.org/2020/02/08/eight-killed-40-injured-in-village-clashes-in-kazakhstan/
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