Eighty copper miners at the Annenskiy mine near Zhezkazgan in central Kazakhstan called a strike May 4 to demand pay increases. Two hundred workers from the nearby mines of Yuzhniy and Vostochny soon joined them. According to Kazakhmys, the company that operates the mines, the workers' average salary was $1,600 per month, but the workers claimed their actual pay was much lower. By May 6, Kazakhmys had reached an agreement with the workers.

It was only recently that 16 people were killed in December 2011 during a police crackdown on oil workers protesting in Zhanaozhen in southwest Kazakhstan. The government received heavy international criticism for the incident and responded by adopting a more conciliatory approach to labor strikes, such as re-training and re-employing workers. Indeed, in the most recent strike it appears that neither Kazakhmys nor the government, which has a 26 percent stake in the company, was interested in seeing a return to violent protest. But in offering concessions to head off a potential security disruption, the government in Astana may find itself encouraging strikes in other sectors.

The copper miners' strike was the country's second significant strike in 2012. In January, 200 construction workers in the western Atyrau region went on strike to demand better pay. The companies that employed the workers were affiliated with Senimdi Kurylys, which does construction for Tengizchevroil, a consortium that runs the massive Tengiz oil field — one of Kazakhstan's three big energy projects and one of its largest sources of revenue. Like the strike in the copper mines, the construction workers' strike did not turn violent. Rather, it was quickly resolved with the Kazakh government's offer of a 25 percent pay increase, which most of the workers accepted.

The government's concessions in the recent strikes are intended to ensure domestic security and head off a potential recurrence of the Zhanaozhen incident. But because the government has shown itself quick to offer concessions, and because of the country's current economic instability, workers in other sectors could take this opportunity to strike to demand better pay. For the Kazakh government, there is a fine line to walk between preventing a return to unrest and discouraging additional protests for demands that Astana cannot afford to satisfy.