ALMATY (Reuters – Kazakh President Kassym Jomart Tkayev has accepted the resignation of the government on Wednesday. This was after protests erupted due to a sharp rise in the fuel price.

On Tuesday, hundreds of protesters were driven from Almaty’s central square by police using tear gas and stun guns. The clashes continued in the surrounding areas for hours.

Protests in the Soviet Union shaken its image as a stable, tightly controlled nation. This has allowed it to draw hundreds of billions of dollar of investment from abroad into its metal and oil industries during three decades of independence.

Tokayev, who declared an emergency in Almaty as well as the western Mangistau oil-producing provinces early Wednesday morning, said that foreign and domestic provocateurs are behind the violence.

Mangistau Province protested the removal of price caps for liquefied petroleum gasoline, an important car fuel. The price cap was lifted on Sunday.

Tokayev, speaking to the acting members of cabinet on Wednesday, ordered their provincial governors and them to reintroduce LPG price controls, and expand them to gasoline and diesel, and other “socially significant” goods.

The government was also instructed to create a personal bankruptcy law, consider subsidising rent payments and freezing utility prices.

After the declaration of a state emergency, which resulted in a curfew as well as movement restrictions, he said that the situation had improved in the protest-hit towns and cities.