Kazakhstan - Central Asia - page 122

many hotels and travel agencies can handle
your registration for a fee of around 3000T
to 5000T, or you can spend time going to the
migration police in Almaty, Astana or one of
Kazakhstan's 14 regional capitals. Registration
is supposed to be free, and usually is, though
it's possible some oices might request 'ad-
ministrative charges' of up to 1000T or so.
migration police oices are generally open for
limited hours, often in the morning only, and
some close completely on certain weekdays
as well as weekends. They also close on pub-
lic holidays and often on mondays following
public holidays that fall on a weekend. Take
your migration card and passport, photocop-
ies of the migration card and the passport's
personal-details and Kazakhstan-visa pages,
and the address of your hotel (don't give a
private address). You may have to ill in a form
in Russian, available at the migration-police
oice and often also at nearby photocopy
shops (which can often help you ill it in). You'll
be told when to come back and collect your
documents, which could be any time from 15
minutes to two working days later. The oicial
ine for registering late is US$100.
Note that if you have a double-entry or tri-
ple-entry visa, you must be registered again
each time you re-enter Kazakhstan (unless
you are leaving again within five days).
The registration rules change from time to
time and may be interpreted differently in
different places: check the situation when
you get your visa and again when you reach
Kazakhstan. Immigration police outside Al-
maty, even in Astana, will often only register
you for five to 10 days, meaning that you will
have to re-register elsewhere if you stay in the
country longer.
If your visa was obtained with a letter of
invitation (LOI) and you are registering at a
migration police oice, they may want to see
not just the LOI itself but also extra paperwork
from the LOI issuer. If you can't obtain this (for
example if the issuer is in Almaty and you are
on the other side of the country), provincial

migration police will often only register you for
ive days or even refuse to register you at all -
check with your LOI provider in advance if this
is a possibility.
SAFE TRAVEL
Kazakhstan is a safe country to travel in, pro-
vided you follow normal safety precautions.
Since 2011 there have been a few scattered
violent attacks, blamed by the government
on Islamist terrorism, and that year security
forces shot dead at least 14 demonstrators
in the western town of Zhanaozen - but you
would have to be very unlucky to be in the
wrong place at the wrong time.
For more information on safe travel, as well
as tips for dealing with police and other of-
icials, see p474.
TELEPHONE
You can make phone calls for cash from some
internet cafes and (less common) shops and
kiosks with phones for public use.
International Calling Cards
You can cut costs for international calls from
landlines or mobile phones by using pre-paid
cards such as the Nursat i-Card+, sold at
mobile-phone shops, petrol stations, kiosks
and some supermarkets. You scratch of a PIN
then dial a local access number given on the
card. Calling instructions are then available in
English. Calls cost around 12T per minute to
the USA, Canada or China; 20T per minute to
Uzbekistan or Russia; 35T to 95T per minute
to other Central Asian countries, Britain, ger-
many, Italy and France.
Mobile (Cell) Phones
Almost everyone in Kazakhstan has a mobile
phone and it's easy to get a local SIm card for
your phone if you have an unlocked gSm-900
frequency phone (this includes most Euro-
pean mobiles but not most North American
ones). Shops and kiosks selling SIm cards
with call credit for a few hundred tenge are
everywhere. Take your passport when you go

HOW¨TO¨DIAL¨FROM¨KAZAKHSTAN¨PHONES
FROM TO DIAL

Any phone mobile in Kazakhstan or Russia % 8 + mobile number or % 7 + mobile number

Landline Other countries except Russia % 8 + 10 + country code + area code + local

number

Landline Landline in other Kazakh city

or Russia

% 8 + area code + local number

Landline Landline in same city local number only

mobile Landline in Kazakhstan or Russia % 8 + area code + local number or % 7 + area

code + local number

mobile Other countries except Russia country code + area code + local number