The Uyghur Cyrillic alphabet (cyr. , lat. Uyghur Siril Yëziqi or USY) is a Cyrillic-derived alphabet used for writing the Uyghur language, primarily by Uyghurs living in Kazakhstan and former CIS countries.It was devised around 1937 by the Soviet Union, which wanted an alternative to the Latin-derived alphabet they had devised some eleven years earlier, in 1926, as they feared a romanization of the Uyghur language would strengthen the relationship of the Uyghurs to Turkey, which had switched to a Latin-based alphabet in 1927-1928.