Since Tokayev became a president, IMO relations between Russia and Kazakhstan are getting worse. Of course especially after invasion. But Kazakhstan and Russia

Since Tokayev became a president, IMO relations between Russia and Kazakhstan are getting worse. Of course especially after invasion. But Kazakhstan and Russia are far from enemies, at least for the time being. They have deep economic ties. As I see it, Kazakhstan tries to build more independent economy but it's not really easy to do so, when the only real alternative is China which is completely foreign and many Kazakhs are afraid of Chinese invasion (not military, but economical, buying land and so on). And of course it's kind of hard to defend huge country with the population of 18 million. So military alliance with strong neighbour is kind of necessary in this situation and Russia provides one.