Jew-baiting, urine-drinking caricature outrages a nation

ALMATY, KAZAKHSTAN -Suddenly, the war between one comedian and an entire nation state is getting personal.

Sacha Baron Cohen's creation of Borat, a Jew-baiting, sister-snogging, horse-urine-drinking Kazakh television reporter, has so angered the former Soviet republic that it is fighting back with every means at its disposal - including a local celebrity who calls himself Borat's brother.

So, as Baron Cohen's mockumentary, Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan, opens in the United States, perhaps the strangest feud in the history of light entertainment grows ever more bizarre.

To date, Borat - famous, among other indelicacies, for singing, "Throw the Jew down the well" at a US country and western bar and arriving at a film premiere on a wagon pulled by four peasant women - has provoked the Kazakh authorities to ban his website, threaten legal action, make formal protests and buy time on US television to correct the portrayal of their countrymen as primitives.

Now, Kazakh celebrities have joined the conflict, and leading them is Jantik, the man who was once the country's closest equivalent to Borat.

Slipping into character for a new, avenging role as Borat's "brother", he says: "I was on the Tube in London. A black man comes to sit opposite me, and keeps staring. I say, 'What are you staring at?' but he keeps looking hard. He finally asks me to come back to his place. I had never come across a homosexual man before. In the Soviet Union, it was a crime. We were told it was our duty to beat them. It is different now - we have at least three gay bars in Almaty."

Then, more seriously, he adds: "Perhaps we should show the world that we are cleverer than Borat." He is threatening to attend the London premiere of the film as Borat's brother, with his mother and horse.

Baron Cohen's movie opens with Borat introducing his fellow Kazakh villagers before he leaves for a reporting stint in America. The line-up includes the "town rapist - Naughty, naughty!" - and a blond he kisses full on the lips. She turns out to be his sister, whom he proudly calls "fourth best prostitute in all of country" while she holds up her trophy for the camera. He then leaves in a car pulled by a horse.

Jantik, 33 - full name Jantemir Baimukhamedov - became one of Kazakhstan's most popular TV personalities on the local equivalent of MTV. He admits he occasionally lampooned guests to get laughs. But unlike Baron Cohen, he says, he stopped this "victim comedy" a long time ago and complains that Borat is "very rough" with those he interviews.

Jantik, now a musician and film-maker, said: "I am so proud of being from Kazakhstan. People have seen Borat, but no one has come to see what we are like and to ask what we think of him."

Kazakhs, who feel their ethnic identity has been hijacked by the comedian, have accused Baron Cohen of racism, and the Government is threatening legal action. (Baron Cohen, himself Jewish, replied in character, saying: "I am glad they are suing this Jew.") The Kazakh Ambassador in London told Trevor Phillips, head of the Commission for Racial Equality, that if Borat were black or Asian, Baron Cohen's act would be blatantly unacceptable. One Kazakh official is reported to have said: "Why does he pick on Kazakhstan? The other 'stans' are much worse."

Baron Cohen's fans argue that Borat has put Kazakhstan on the map and that his main target is the prejudices of others. Jantik disagrees: "What he creates in his comedy is just hate."

- INDEPENDENT


Borat's Kazakhstan - satire or slander?

* Intoxicating tipple
Kazakhs drink fermented horse's urine, which Borat claims is Kazakh wine.
Actually ...Kazakhs drink fermented horses' milk, kumys.

* What's in a name
Borat spells the name of the country's President, Nursultan Nazharbayev, when he lists his heroes.
Actually ...The name is Nursultan Nazarbayev. (Many real-life Westerners mispronounce Na-zar-bayev as Na-zhar-bayev.)

Pecking order
* Borat affects to be shocked when told that women vote in the United States and says in his country women come after God, man, horse and dog in order of importance.
Actually ...Women have the right to vote in Kazakhstan although the country has yet to hold elections judged free and fair by Western observers.

Religious intolerance
* Borat is venomously anti-semitic.
Actually ...Nazarbayev has said he wants his country to be a beacon of religious tolerance. In reality, anti-semitism is widespread across the former Soviet Union.

Keep your hat on
* Borat, who is also homophobic, says that since the 2003 "Tuleyakiv" reforms, "homosexuals no longer have to wear blue hats".
Actually ...Homosexuality was illegal in the Soviet Union though wearing blue hats was not a sanction. According to gay.kz, Kazakhstan decriminalised homosexuality in 1997.

- REUTERS