Cardiff University has defended the opening of its first overseas campus, thousands of miles away in Kazakhstan, after a union said the move posed a risk to its reputation.

More than 300 students have started lectures at the new campus, named Cardiff University Kazakhstan, in the capital Astana.

The University and College Union (UCU) raised concerns about the Central Asian republic’s record on human rights and questioned the speed with which the project had been set up.

Vice Chancellor Wendy Larner said due diligence had been followed and the Kazakhstani campus offered opportunities for the institution and for Wales.

Earlier this year, Cardiff University announced significant cuts to jobs and departments to address a multi-million-pound hole in its budget.

It said the new campus, which is 3,700 miles (5,955km) from Cardiff, was part of a strategy to boost transnational education in the wake of financial pressures facing the higher education sector.

BBC Wales has attempted to contact the Kazakhstani government for comment.

Andy Williams, from the UCU, said it was not opposed to the venture in principle, but that it had serious concerns regarding staff workload and the speed with which it had been set up.

He said the venture had been planned “much more quickly than university courses and programmes usually are planned”.

“This is a country with poor human rights records and poor records on protecting the interests and lives of queer people in particular – we’re worried about that,” he said.

“We’re worried about the risks to the reputation of Cardiff University should this go wrong.”

He referenced the damage done to the reputation of the University of Wales after a Malaysian pop star with a bogus doctorate ran a college offering courses at the university.

“We really, really, really think that this needs to be done in a considered way,” he said.

A deal to open a new Cardiff University branch was signed with the Kazakhstani government in November 2024, and Prof Larner said “due diligence has been done diligently”.

She said the “large, youthful country” offered opportunities for the university as it explored more potential transnational education projects, including new ventures in Singapore and China.

Many universities were looking for overseas opportunities following a decline in the number of international students applying, she said.

“I think about this very simply – if the international students are not coming to us in the same number, we might need to go to them,” she said.

“And that’s why many universities, not just Cardiff University, are exploring transnational education as part of their future.”

Jim Dickinson, associate editor at higher education blog Wonkhe, said transnational education was “pretty widespread and common”.

He said it was partly about “reputation and visibility”, as well as improving research and industry links, but also “about income diversification”.

But he said there were “significant risks”, including ensuring the quality of degrees, as well as maintaining academic freedom with different laws “around freedom of speech, limits on protest, potential limits on research”.

Addressing concerns about the country’s human rights record Prof Larner said the Kazakhstani government “would be the first to acknowledge that the historic human rights record isn’t what it should have been”.

“They’ve been working really hard to address that with quite significant success.”

She also said the university having a presence in the country meant they were “educating a generation of leaders for the future with whom we will be sharing our values”.

The Kazakhstani government is funding 500 scholarships for students to go the university over three years, while a business group called the Qualified Centre of Education Public Foundation (QCEF) paid for the campus.

The UCU has raised concerns about the university’s partnership with QCEF, of which it said little is known.

The vice chancellor said the foundation was a “very reputable” group of leading Kazakhstani business people.

Lectures began last week but the campus was officially opened on 3 September – the day before Kazakhstan hosted the Wales men’s football team for a World Cup qualifier in the city.

Madison Hutchinson, Cardiff University Kazakhstan’s student experience advisor, said setting up the campus was “a really positive thing”, adding many Kazakhstani students could not afford to study in the UK.

“So the fact that they can get a UK education in their home country is life-changing for some of them”, she said.

Students are currently studying a foundation year to get them ready for degree programmes, including Asset, 17, who will be studying business management.

He said since he was young he has been interested in British culture.

“So Cardiff University gives me an opportunity to feel that out before I go to study abroad – maybe in the UK for a master’s degree,” he said.

Prof Larner said establishing the campus was “low risk”, while acknowledging that the former Soviet republic was “in an interesting part of the world” at a “volatile time geopolitically”.

“This isn’t just about putting Cardiff University on the map. This is putting Wales on the map in a part of the world that is very ambitious, that is growing rapidly and could be a real opportunity for us all,” she said.

Amid job cuts at home, Cardiff University also said 34 fewer posts would need to go as a result of staffing the new Kazakhstan campus.

Prof Larner said the university was not “out of the woods” when it came to financial pressures but transnational education was one part of finding “new revenue streams”.

Astrophysicist Dr Nicolas Peretto will be teaching a data science module at the Astana campus starting in April.

“It was something which was really attractive to me in terms of getting to know a different country,” he said.

Dr Peretto said some of the concerns around the venture were “probably valid”.

But he added: “I’m here to teach and educate and I’m prepared to focus on the students that I will be meeting there.

He said he would be teaching a course on data science “which is about critical thinking”.

“I try to focus on that aspect rather than on all the possible negative aspects that are linked to that initiative,” he said.

Other Welsh universities have a range of international partnerships.

Bangor University has a campus in China and its degrees can also be studied in Bahrain.

The University of Wales Trinity St David said it had a partnership agreement with Lanzhou University College Wales in China and a 3.7% interest in the International Universiti Malaya-Wales in Kuala Lumpur.

Cardiff Metropolitan University does not have an overseas campus but its degrees are taught in locations including Singapore, Lebanon, and Sri Lanka while Wrexham University’s partners include institutions in China, Myanmar and Greece.

In June 2025, Swansea University announced its biggest transnational education arrangement so far to establish an institute with Nanjing Tech University in China.

Aberystwyth University closed a campus in Mauritius in 2018, two years after it opened. It said its degrees were only available in Aberystwyth, while the University of South Wales said its partner colleges were in the UK.