AS SENSE of humour failures go, it has been viewed as one of biggest to grace the world stage in recent years.

The reaction of Kazakhstan to the release of Borat, Sacha Baron Cohen’s satirical film portraying it as a nation of Jew-hating peasants with a fondness for drinking fermented horse urine, has included ministerial announcements, patriotic outcry and a global public relations campaign.

But on Monday night, after suffering months of gibes, the Kazakhs finally got the joke. Well, some of it...except the horse’s urine and the Jews.

After watching a private screening of the spoof documentary with The Times, Kazakhstan’s most senior envoy to Britain admitted that the controversial comedy was actually quite good. Erlan Idrissov, the Ambassador to Britain since 2002, spent the majority of Borat: Cultural Learnings of America for Make Benefit Glorious Nation of Kazakhstan — which has its British premiere at The Times BFI London Film Festival tonight — with a beatific smile on his face.

But he was overcome when the film’s protagonist pursues a live chicken through the carriage of a New York Metro train. He also burst into laughter when an American government official agrees to eat cheese at the beginning of an interview because it is a “Kazakh tradition”, only to be told that it has been made from human milk. “My wife make this cheese,” Borat informs the official, who chews enthusiastically until Borat adds: “She make it from milk from her tit.”

Other scenes to raise a laugh included footage of a car salesman who is duped into assessing a car’s suitability for running over Gypsies.

But Mr Idrissov sat in stoney silence when Borat suggested that Kazakhs have a Pamplona-style festival called “the Running of the Jew” in which citizens flee from people wearing giant caricature masks.

The admission that some of the jokes will appeal to Kazakhs follows months of diplomatic manoeuvring to promote the country’s attractions. The Government hired two public relations firms to counter the bad publicity and bought a four-page advertisement in The New York Times. The White House was obliged to deny suggestions that President Bush had discussed the film with President Nazarbayev, the visiting Kazakh leader.

Rakhat Aliyev, his son-in-law, extended an invitation to Baron Cohen to visit Kazakhstan to learn what it was really like. “He can discover a lot of things,” he said. “Women drive cars, wine is made of grapes and Jews are free to go to synagogue.”

The ambassador, who previously voiced concern over the film before he had seen it, admitted that he was amused by parts of it but remained uneasy about the film’s power to mislead. “I sincerely laughed at many of the jokes, but at the same time couldn’t get rid of a feeling of being a bit insulted,” he said. “Maybe it’s difficult to understand — it takes changing the shoes.”

He retains his view that Kazakhs are generally opposed to racial slurs and people who indulge in them. “By all means laugh at Borat if you will, but I suspect that once you know something of the true Kazakhstan, his antics will leave a nasty aftertaste. Indeed, you may not laugh at all.”

Baron Cohen, who will attend the premiere in Leicester Square tonight in character, has not had any contact with the Kazakh authorities

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