What's the special significance of being from Kazakhstan? How do they differ from other foreigners?

I'm not sure what your asking. In this case the company was hiring them because they were incredibly cheap.

You mentioned “KZ foreigners” instead of just “foreigners” which implies that the “KZ” part has some significance.

Idk was just being specific, no motivation other than that. They were incredibly cheap though. I was told 3 or 4 of them could be hired for 130k~ total.

Lots of Russians fled to KZ in 2022.

These were definitely Kazakhstanians not Russians.

did you get it conflated with pakistan maybe.

No, I hired them myself at the behest of the company, trained them, and then was fired because they were cheaper.