When Kazakhstan announced on November 6, during President Kassym-Jomart Tokayev’s visit to Washington, that it would join the Abraham Accords, the decision raised a more interesting question than the move itself: why did Astana take this step before Azerbaijan—despite Azerbaijan’s far deeper and longer-standing strategic ties with Israel?
For years, Azerbaijan had been widely viewed as the natural candidate to lead Central Asia and the Turkic world into the Accords framework. Its close cooperation with Israel in energy, defense, and intelligence, combined with shared concerns about Iran, made Baku the obvious frontrunner. Yet when the moment arrived, it was Kazakhstan—not Azerbaijan—that moved first.
The explanation lies less in bilateral relations with Israel than in how the Abraham Accords are currently being deployed.
Reactivating and expanding the Abraham Accords has become a priority of the Trump administration. While the Accords formalize normalization between Israel and Muslim states that were never at war with it—and therefore differ fundamentally from classic peace treaties—their current strategic significance extends well beyond Israel. They function as a framework for advancing American influence in regions contested by Iran, China, and Russia. From this perspective, Kazakhstan’s decision was driven not by the state of its relations with Israel, which have long been stable, but by Astana’s broader geopolitical weight and signaling value.
Kazakhstan’s move was therefore not ideological and only marginally symbolic; it was a calculated signal to Washington—one that Astana could afford to send, and Baku could not as its relations with Moscow remain strained. As a result, it cannot discard Turkey, whose stance on the Abraham Accords remains highly critical.
Moreover, Iran feared that by joining the Accords Baku could encourage other Central Asian and Turkic states to participate in this process. Iranian media warned that “by bringing Central Asian countries closer to Israel, Baku is participating in the “Great Game” being played by the United States.
Kazakhstan’s strategic calculus
Kazakhstan endorsed the Abraham Accords to strengthen relations with the Trump administration in what was a symbolic political act with potential for economic cooperation in sectors such as water management and technology. Astana—which has always adopted a multi-vector stance as a central axis of its middle-power policies—aims to build rapport with the U.S. without straining ties with Russia or China.
Economic and Security Incentives
President Tokayev, anticipating “certain dividends” from cooperation,characterized the significance of joining the Accords as primarily economic. The move coincided with significant commercial breakthroughs withWashington:
- The U.S. finalized a $1.1 billion deal granting an American firm rights to develop Kazakhstan’s large, untapped tungsten deposits.
- Kazakhstan also signed $17.2 billion in new agreements with U.S. companies across mineral resources, digital technologies, and aviation.
- Kazakhstan welcomes this approach, which seeks U.S. investment and technology as a counterbalance to its powerful neighbors. Furthermore, participation in the Abraham Accords framework is viewed as an opportunity to upgrade security cooperation with Israel, particularly in defense purchases and high-tech weapons procurement, which were previously limited by Kazakhstan’s classification level.
Kazakhstan’s importance
Kazakhstan is crucial due to its vast natural resources, ranking sixth globally in total reserves, withninety-nine chemical elements of the periodic table found within its territory.
• Uranium: Kazakhstan is the world’s largest uranium producer, accounting for over 40% of global production, and it possesses 14% of the world’s uranium resources. It already supplies a quarter of America’s uranium needs.
• Critical Minerals: Kazakhstan is rich in critical materials—including tungsten, molybdenum, tantalum, niobium, tin, and rare-earth metals (REMs)—that are vital to the global energy transition. The U.S. and EU are pursuing partnerships with Central Asia to secure stable supply chains for these minerals and reduce dependence on China.
Balancing between Russia and China
Kazakhstan’s multi-vector foreign policy requires a delicate balance between attracting Western investment and maintaining complex relationships with Moscow and Beijing.
For Russia, Kazakhstan remains a close ally and a pivotal geographic link. Geopolitically, it is considered “vital geography for Russia’s southward policy” and a crucial member of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) and the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO).
Crucially, Central Asian nations, including Kazakhstan, have emerged as key players in supporting Russia’s efforts to evade international sanctions imposed after the invasion of Ukraine. Kazakhstan serves as a vital channel for sanctioned goods and financial transactions, enabling Russia to circumvent restrictions and access critical resources. The EAEU explicitly functions as a key facilitator of this evasion. Russia also maintains strategic partnerships in Kazakhstan’s nuclear sector, having recently been selected to build the country’s first planned nuclear power plant.
For China, Kazakhstan’s importance lies in transportation and resources. Beijing uses Kazakhstan’s vast territory as a land corridor to transport goods westward to Europe as part of its Belt and Road Initiative (BRI). China has significant security and economic interests in the region, including securing mineral supply chains and ensuring regional stability to protect its investments.
While China uses Central Asia as a conduit for dual-use and military resources to support Russia’s sanctions evasion, Kazakh society harbors major fears of China’s growing influence, driven by concerns about environmental pollution, debt, land use, and the persecution of ethnic Kazakhs and Uyghurs in Xinjiang. China also maintains strategic cooperation with Kazakhstan in the nuclear industry, particularly regarding the Ulba fuel fabrication plant.
Astana’s Relations with Iran
Kazakhstan pursues a multivector foreign policy, carefully balancing among competing geopolitical actors to avoid conflict.Its relations with Iran fitsquarely within this framework . Astana carefully weighs the potential costs and benefits ofengagements and there is little indication that Tehran can offer it meaningful economic upside. Iran has neither investment capital nor advanced technologies to offer KAstana.
Iran’s president, Masoud Pezeshkian, began a three-day visit to Kazakhstan and Turkmenistan on December 11. Upon arrival, Pezeshkian described the trip in positive terms, expressing hope that improved cooperation with neighboring countries would help resolve current challenges.
In Turkmenistan, he attended the International Peace and Trust Summit in Ashgabat, where he accused Israel of having “a special privilege to be the source of many wars and injustices in the region.”
In Astana, Pezeshkian oversaw the signing of numerous bilateral agreements and a joint declaration. Kazakhstan’s President Kasym-Zhomart Tokayev and his Iranian counterpart pledged to increase bilateral trade to $3 billion and highlighted plans to enhance connectivity through key transit corridors, such as the Kazakhstan-Turkmenistan-Iran route.
Earlier, speaking at a Kazakh-Iranian business forum attended by Pezeshkian, Tokayev announced Kazakhstan would build a freight terminal at the Iranian port of Shahid Rajaee on the Strait of Hormuz.
How does Iran see future relations with Kazakhstan?
Despite Astana joining the Abraham Accords, Iranian media coverage has remained diplomatic and broadly positive, highlighting the economic potential of cooperation with Kazakhstan. From Tehran’s perspective, Kazakhstan’s importance lies in the transit routes it offers, especially connectivity between the two through the Caspian Sea. Against the backdrop of Iran’s isolation from the West and major global
markets, Iranian diplomacy emphasizes the country’s achievements in developing ties with “non-aligned” countries such as Kazakhstan.
Despite the overwhelmingly positive tone, expert commentary and unofficial discourse in Iran reveal a more nuanced view of relations with Kazakhstan. Some news outlets describe Astana’s decision to join the Abraham Accords as part of a broader U.S.-Israeli strategy to isolate Iran in Central Asia, potentially encouraging other states, such as Uzbekistan and Kyrgyzstan, to follow suit while marginalizing Tehran’s regional partners, including Tajikistan and Turkmenistan.
The Iranian outlet Khabaronline dismissed the move as “ridiculous” and propagandistic, arguing that it exploits divisions within the Muslim world without producing any substantive change, as Kazakhstan’s ties with Israel were already well established.
Social media reactions have been even more candid, amplifying Iranian criticism, with users calling it a “rejected step” that whitewashes Israeli actions in Gaza and risks aligning Kazakhstan with what they termed “fascist entities.” Other posts portrayed the move as serving U.S. U.S. geopolitical interests over Kazakhstan’s own interests , and called on Arab and Islamic nations to sever ties with Israel.
This divergence illustrates how official Iranian rhetoric prioritizes pragmatism, while unofficial voices express ideological concerns aligned with Iran’s anti-normalization stance.More broadly, this dynamic suggests that behind official rhetoric, multiple interests are at play. Had relations with Kazakhstan been of major strategic significance for Iran, media reactions would have been far more controlled. Conversely, Kazakhstan’s decision to join the the Abraham Accords reflects genuine and practical considerations. Given Astana’s years-long tradition of long-term political balancing, it is clear that its decision to join the Abraham Accords advances concrete geopoliticalobjectives that go far beyond symbolic gestures of goodwill.
JISS Policy Papers are published through the generosity of the Greg Rosshandler Family.
This article is part of a series on Iran and the Former Soviet States
