Comedian Sacha Baron Cohen has been threatened with legal action by Kazakhstan's Foreign Ministry, after allegedly presenting the country in a "derogatory way" at the recent MTV Europe Awards.
Baron Cohen, who plays Ali G, presented the awards ceremony in the character of Borat, a spoof Kazakhstani television presenter featured in 'Da Ali G Show'.
Kazakh Foreign Ministry spokesperson Yerzhan Ashykbayev said: "We do not rule out that Mr. Cohen is serving someone's political order designed to present Kazakhstan and its people in a derogatory way.
"We reserve the right to any legal action to prevent new pranks of the kind," the spokesperson also said.
Baron Cohen's character Borat performed a sketch in which he arrived at the MTV Europe Awards in an Air Kazakh propeller plane controlled by a one-eyed pilot holding a vodka bottle.
"We view Mr. Cohen's behaviour at the MTV Europe Music Awards as utterly unacceptable, being a concoction of bad taste and ill manners which is completely incompatible with ethics and civilised behaviour," Ashykbayev also said.
