Kazakhstan, 2023 — dissident coup conspiracy

Event Summary

This entry is coded 15 November 2023 in Kazakhstan and falls within a period in which the government of President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev repeatedly framed unrest and alleged conspiracies as coup attempts, though no discrete coup plot precisely on that date is confirmed in the sources located for this entry. The defining episode was the January 2022 unrest, known as Bloody January, which began over fuel prices and escalated into deadly violence; Tokayev described it as an attempted coup d'etat, blamed foreign-trained bandits and terrorists, and invited Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization troops to help restore order. In January 2023 the prosecutor general told parliament the January 2022 unrest had been an attempted coup secretly prepared over the whole of 2021, and former security chief Karim Massimov was later sentenced to 18 years for treason and attempting a coup.

Ahead of the November 2022 snap presidential vote, the security service also said it foiled a plot by a group planning to organize riots, a coup, and a provisional government. The 15 November 2023 coding is best understood against this documented pattern of coup-plot allegations rather than a single confirmed plot on the day.