Kazakhstan surpassed China, France and the UK in terms of nuclear capacity – Tokayev

NUR-SULTAN. KAZINFORM – President of Kazakhstan Kassym-Jomart Tokayev recalled how high Kazakhstan’s nuclear capacity was before the disarmament, Kazinform correspondent reports.

«The Decree of the First President of Kazakhstan-Elbasy on closing the Semipalatinsk Nuclear Test Site has historic significance. The site’s operation did harm to the people who lived in the area and local nature», said Kassym-Jomart Tokayev at the awarding ceremony of the Nazarbayev Prize for Nuclear Weapon Free World and Global Security. According to him, one of the Soviet-made bombs was 26 times more powerful than the one dropped on Hiroshima and Nagasaki.

Radioactive residues spread over hundreds of kilometers. To date, we still see the effects of the nuclear tests. Despite the resistance of the Soviet military elite and individual politicians the First President’s decision to shut down the nuclear test site required great courage. It has become a catalyst for the entire global anti-nuclear movement», noted the Head of State.

«After the USSR collapse, Kazakhstan gained the status of one of the largest nuclear missile potential holders in the world. We had more than 100 intercontinental ballistic missiles with 1.4 thousand nuclear warheads. Our country had all the resources to hold mass destruction weapons. In order to approximately imagine how powerful Kazakhstan was it is enough to say that our country’s nuclear power left behind the aggregate nuclear powers of France, the UK and China», added the President.