25 November 2022

...[T]he site profiles the Astana Light Rail Transit (LRT) in the capital, which has become known popularly as “a monument to corruption.” Millions of dollars allocated to the project were allegedly embezzled with only a fraction of the railway – some of the concrete supports for the track – completed to date.

Asked this year for information about environmental analysis done on the LRT and its impact on the river Yesil, environmental authorities in Astana responded that they had destroyed project documents because they were not required to hold them longer than five years.

The prime minister said last month that his government had allocated a further 20 billion tenge ($43 million) to Chinese and local contractors overseeing construction of the LRT, which was expected to be completed in June 2020.