By Mary Picard
The Disaster Law Programme has now published, for the first time in its English translation, a report commissioned by the Kazakhstan Red Crescent with support from the IFRC and the Norwegian Red Cross analysing Kazakhstan’s legal preparedness for international disaster assistance. The question of disaster response is important for Kazakhstan, as its vast territory includes a variety of terrain subject to different natural and man-made hazards, including earthquakes, floods, mud flows, avalanches, landslides, and landfalls.
The report, prepared by Professor Marat Sarsembaev, found that Kazakhstan has made significant progress in establishing a clearer legal and institutional structure for national level response to disasters, as it has recently adopted comprehensive legislation on disaster management. Under these arrangements the Ministry of Emergency Situations is responsible for the coordination of disaster prevention and response efforts. Kazakhstan has also entered a number of relevant regional agreements related to mutual cooperation in times of disaster. However, although some changes were made to Kazakhstan’s civil defence law in 2011, the report proposes a range of reforms to this and other laws that would enhance Kazakhstan’s legal preparedness for the facilitation and coordination of international response and initial recovery assistance, based on the IDRL Guidelines.
Read the report here.