Kyrgyzstan announces competition for new National Anthem

The Ministry of Culture, Information, Sports, and Youth Policy of Kyrgyzstan has launched a competition to select the best proposals for a new version of the Kyrgyz Republic's national anthem, both in terms of lyrics and music.

According to the announcement, the competition aims to create "a highly artistic musical composition that reflects the historical heritage, cultural traditions, and national unity of the Kyrgyz people."

The ministry has outlined the criteria for evaluating the submissions. These include qualities such as solemnity, patriotism, emotional expressiveness, national identity, harmony of sound, ease of perception, and the text’s alignment with the norms of the Kyrgyz literary language.

The idea to revise Kyrgyzstan’s national anthem was first proposed in late October 2024 by Nurlanbek Turgunbek uulu, Speaker of the Kyrgyz Parliament. "We changed the flag, and now it's time to update the anthem," he said. "When the anthem was adopted, the country had just separated from the Soviet Union and was taking its first steps toward independence. Additionally, it is difficult to sing, and not every Kyrgyz can perform it," he added. The new anthem is expected to be adopted by April 2025.

Later, President Sadyr Japarov expressed his support for the idea of altering the national symbol, emphasizing there was nothing wrong with such a change.

In 2023, the Speaker of the Kyrgyz Parliament also led efforts to modify the national flag, a change that was later approved by the legislative body.

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