Below is the translation of Adam Kesher’s post on the Russian-language blog

Despite the apparently illegal interception of the top officials’ telephone conversations, the General Prosecutor’s Office still has not started investigation into the matter. The Ministry of Internal Affairs stated that audiofiles and print-outs are “most likely not authentic”. KNB - the National Security Committee - was the only structure that launched a criminal investigation, de facto admitting authenticity of the wiretaps. Moreover, the Committee is already up to indict ex-leaders of special services Rakhat Aliev and Alnur Musaev, as well as their crony, businessman Sergey Manevich.

Meanwhile, no significant news arrive from the courtroom, where the trial over the Aliyev’s “organized criminal grouping” has started. At the second court session the defense tilted with the prosecution on petty technical questions. In the meantime, Aliev’s idea of Kazakhstan’s OSCE chairmanship, being initially his trump card (most likely, he planned to get Astana on the chair by “blackmailing” the Western countries and assumed that consequently it would have a positive effect on his image; currently he is doing his best not to allow Kazakhstan to get the chair) undergoes a crisis.

The CIS countries are preparing another ultimatum to the OSCE – they don’t want to quit the Organization, but want to change it instead so that it would not include ODIHR. It was back in 2005 when Kremlin first voiced the idea of OSCE’s reform. The “club of autocrats” readily supported the idea, with Kazakhstan in the front line. The post-soviets already tried to cripple the consensus of the Ministerial Council in Brussels last year. Now it seems that they decided to bargain – either Kazakhstan gets the post, or OSCE should be reformed. Though it is all clear that both will never happen, and everything will remain the same.