Kazakhstan reshuffles cabinet after replacing PM

ASTANA, Jan 11 (Reuters) Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev today shifted his foreign minister Kasymzhomart Tokayev to head the upper chamber of parliament, making him a potential stand-in president.

As speaker of the Senate, Tokayev would take over as acting president if 66-year-old Nazarbayev was not able to carry out his duties. One analyst said the post made Tokayev a possible successor to Nazarbayev.

The change followed the appointment of Karim Masimov as prime minister yesterday to replace Danial Akhmetov who resigned unexpectedly on Monday after 3-1/2 years in the job.

Former Soviet Kazakhstan is the largest Central Asian state.

It produces around a million barrels of oil a day, mainly for markets in the West, but wants to triple production by 2015 to push into the world's top tier of energy exporters.

Marat Tazhin was named as the new foreign minister. Most other ministers in Akhmetov's government will keep their jobs under the new prime minister.

Nazarbayev has run Kazakhhstan since the 1991 breakup of the Soviet Union, balancing power carefully between rival factions and not allowing one or the other to gain too much influence.

Kazakh political analyst Dosym Satpayev said of Tokayev's appointment: ''The person who occupies the number two post under the president is automatically viewed as a potential successor.'' Reuters BDP RN2313