In Kazakhstan, it was a power play to designate a new common enemy (in the case i know, Orthodox christians). The man was close to the president but fell in disgrace. It was used to quell the protests (i was an adult when this happened, so probably after 2009, i'll have to look), and the group that supported him, the Orthodox church, fell with him as public ennemies (it was also racism/ethnicism because most of the orthodox were ukrainians/Cossacks displaced under Staline during the famine, and looked quite different than ethnic Kazakhs). Basically fascistic behavior.

The refugees i've met were all part of the church, so the purge hit a lot of people. Not sure if it worked, after all, i think they changed president recently, but i'm definitely not an expert on the area.

In Russia i have no idea, probably you have underhand deals and politics happening, but its a fairly lock down country, information-wise