Bulat K. Nurgalyev

Bulat Nurgalyev, also known as Bolat Nurgaliyev, entered the Soviet foreign ministry in 1980 and served in Pakistan and India. After Kazakhstan became independent, he joined its foreign ministry, headed the department responsible for international security and arms control, and became deputy foreign minister. He served as ambassador in Washington from 1996 to 2000. ¹

His posting coincided with the expansion of relations beyond the initial nuclear disarmament agenda. At the November 1997 Washington summit, Presidents Bill Clinton and Nursultan Nazarbayev backed an economic partnership program, Caspian energy development, and stronger military contacts. Agreements announced during the visit also addressed peaceful nuclear cooperation and the disposition of material from the BN-350 reactor. ²

Nurgalyev subsequently represented Kazakhstan in South Korea, Japan, and Israel. As secretary-general of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization from 2007 to 2009, and an OSCE representative on protracted conflicts in 2010, he worked in regional institutions as well as bilateral embassies. After retirement from the foreign service he entered policy research. In 2015, he contributed to a National Security Archive conference that brought Kazakh, Russian, and American participants together to reconstruct the history of nuclear threat reduction. ^{1, 3}