Kazakhstan is the world’s largest landlocked country and the ninth-largest in the world, its an economic powerhouse of Central Asia, generating about 60% of the region’s GDP, primarily through its oil/gas industry. At its heart, Kazakhstan is officially a democratic, secular, unitary, constitutional republic with a diverse cultural heritage, and its neighboring countries include Russia, China, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, and Turkmenistan, with an eastern coast near the Caspian sea.