Beibut Saparaly, a cleric at the Astana-based Kaganat religious education center, said in March 2005 that the "idea to create a caliphate is supported by many youth.
[19] Rashid Tusupbekov, the Prosecutor General, asked the Supreme Court to add Hizb ut-Tahrir to the list of banned terrorist organizations on 17 March 2005, citing its ties to Al-Qaeda and the Taliban.
[20] Police arrested Kuanysh Bekzhanov, a 20-year-old student of law at the Humanitarian Institute, in November 2003 at Ordabasy square for distributing Hizb ut-Tahrir pamphlets.
[19] Hibratulla Doskaliyev, head of the South Kazakhstan Region interior department, criticized the government's handling of Hizb ut-Tahrir's growing popularity in August 2006.
Police confiscated weapons, forged documents, a videotape of a speech given by Osama bin Laden, and what Radio Free Europe called "extremist propaganda."
Bekmirzaev's wife, Makhira Ibragimova, and Isa Eruov, Kazakh citizens, killed themselves in suicide bombing attacks in Uzbekistan in spring 2004.
[24] Deutsche Welle and the Uzbek government reported that 15 suspects charged in relation to the Tashkent bombings were trained in terrorist camps in South Waziristan, Pakistan and in "private apartments" in Shymkent, and other cities, in Kazakhstan.
[25] Minenkov said, "Foreign ideologists of terrorism recommended attacking public places and strategically important infrastructure facilities" in letters found by police.
Askar Amerkhanov, head of the National Security Committee Secret Police's Anti-terrorism Center, said, "It is true that at first we did have suspicions that Tabligh was an extremist organisation.
Kairat Tulesov, deputy head of the Justice Ministry's Religious Affairs Committee, said, "Tabligh supporters simply have to observe Kazakh law and then they can pursue their activities without hindrance.
"[31] In November 1999 the KNB arrested 22 people, 12 of whom were Russian citizens, in Öskemen for planning to overthrow the government and seized rifle cartridges and petrol bombs.
On 8 June 2000 the Öskemen court sentenced 13 people, 11 Russians and 2 Kazakhs, convicted of planning to overthrow the local government and of illegal possession of weapons.
Representatives from Australia, Britain, Canada, China, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, Kazakhstan, Russia, Turkey, and the United States met in Rabat, Morocco on 30–31 October 2006 to discuss the protection of nuclear materials and the prevention of theft by terrorists.
President Bush said in a 12 February letter to Nazarbayev, "The United States strongly supports the Conference's objective of fostering peace and stability through dialogue among people of different nationalities and faiths.
"[43] United States Senators Sam Brownback, Orrin Hatch, Mary Landrieu, and representatives Robert Wexler, Gary Ackerman, Henry Waxman, Joseph Pitts and others, signed separate letters of support for the conference, calling it "critical to worldwide efforts to counter extremism."
It sent "a strong signal that the present and future course of the Muslim world will not be controlled by those that would propagate hate, fear and murder, such as Al Qaeda, but by those nations and people who respect and promote peace, tolerance and democracy."
[citation needed] Oral Mukhamedzhanov, Speaker of Kazakhstan's Lower House of Parliament, met with Singaporean President Sellapan Ramanathan on 31 October 2006.
[45] Askar Musinov, Kazakhstan's ambassador to the United Arab Emirates, met with Sayf Bin-Zayid al Nuhayyan, the Interior Minister of the UAE, on 29 November 2006.
[46] Cooperation with the United States in regional counter-terrorism and the U.S.-led War in Iraq elicited praise from Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld,[16] Senator Conrad Burns, Congressman Dennis Rehberg, and other U.S. government officials.
[51] Three Kazakh citizens, Yaqub Abahanov, Abdulrahim Kerimbakiev, and Abdallah Tohtasinovich Magrupov, all born in Semey, Kazakhstan, are held in extrajudicial detention in the United States' Guantanamo Bay detainment camp, in Cuba for alleged ties to the Taliban.
Addressing the possibility, raised by North Atlantic Treaty Organization experts," of using Kazakh airfields for counterterrorist operations, he said there were "other practical issues under consideration," but that Kazakhstan would commit to providing humanitarian assistance to Afghans.
[48] In 2002 a Chinese diplomat accused the United States Government of trying to secure a defunct air base, originally used by the Soviet Union specifically for theoretical military operations against China, near Semey in eastern Kazakhstan.
A high-ranking Kazakh Defense Ministry official said the U.S. Government, as part of its anti-terrorism operations in Central Asia, had requested the use of military bases in Taraz and Taldykorgan.
Ibragim Alibekov, a journalist for Radio Free Europe, characterized President Nursultan Nazarbayev's support for the "anti-terrorism campaign" as cautious and "hesitant on the implementation of concrete cooperation measures.
Holly Cartner, executive director of the Europe and Central Asia division of Human Rights Watch, said, "Kazakhstan should step forward and protect this brave man.
[61] In March 1998 the Uzbek government accused Obidkhon Qori Nazarov, an Imam, of religious extremism, terrorism, and membership in the Islamic Movement of Uzbekistan.
[63] The New York Times reported that the fence will be "eight-foot-high [with] barbed-wire" and searchlights "along heavily populated towns and cities on the southern ridge" where drug smugglers operate.
"[63] In addition to tightening security, Bruce Pannier of Payvand noted increased military spending to strengthen Kazakhstan's border with Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan.
In the interview Kasymov accused the Kazakh government of giving refuge to terrorist organizations, specifically Saudi Binladin Group, which operated in Astana.
[19] The Kazakh Foreign Ministry has since characterized Kasymov's comments as "inappropriate" and "totally deprived of the spirit of the basic documents of [the Shanghai Cooperation Organisation]" because "There weren't and there are not any terrorists' bases or camps on the soil of Kazakhstan.