Rumours about Russian journalist Leonid Mlechin’s new book about the tragic events of January 2022, when mass riots broke out across Kazakhstan following protests that left 230 people dead, began circulating in Kazakhstan back in December — right after the book was presented in Moscow and long before it went on sale. Such interest was to be expected. Mlechin’s work was presented as a documentary study and “the first in-depth analysis of the January crisis”.
However, some suspected from the start that the book was commissioned by the Kazakh authorities and presented the reader with a picture of events that they found favorable. If this is true, it is nonetheless not a reason to abstain from reading it. It is another opportunity to examine the perspective that Tokayev’s team offers society on Bloody January (in Kazakhstan, it is called Qantar: this is both the name of the month in Kazakh and a play on words — “qan” means blood).
The book’s lengthy title is easily divided into two shorter ones — “Tragic January” and “President Tokayev and Lessons Learned”. Mlechin appeared in the media as the author of a study of Qantar, but only the first and fourth chapters of the book — its beginning and its end — are actually dedicated to the topic, creating a kind of portrait frame.
Inside the frame we have a new biography of Kassym-Jomart Tokayev, from his childhood to the present day. Thus, Mlechin gives his own perspective on Tokayev’s image — one whose details do not lack interest. It is these two subjects that the book is devoted to.