Commonwealth of Independent States

The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) is a confederation, or alliance, created by Russia, Ukraine and Byelorussia.

Up to 2005 it consisted of 11 former Soviet Republics: Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. Turkmenistan discontinued permanent membership as of August 26,2005 and is now an associate member.

The creation of CIS signaled the dissolution of the Soviet Union and, according to leaders of Russia, its purpose was to allow a civilized divorce between the Soviet Republics. However, many observers have seen the CIS as a tool that would allow Russia to keep its influence over the post-Soviet states. Since its formation, the member-states of CIS have signed a large number of documents concerning integration and cooperation on matters of economics, defence and foreign policy. The CIS is headquartered in Minsk, Belarus. The chairman of the CIS is known as the executive secretary. All of the CIS's executive secretaries have been from Belarus or Russia. The current executive secretary is former Russian interior minister, Vladimir Rushailo.

Initiating the dissolution of the Soviet Union in the autumn of 1991, the leaders of Russia, Belarus, and Ukraine met on December 8 in the Belovezhskaya Pushcha Natural Reserve, about 50 km north of Brest in Belarus, and signed an agreement establishing" the CIS. At the same time they announced that the new confederation would be open to all republics of the former Soviet Union, as well as other nations sharing the same goals.

Soviet President Mikhail Gorbachev described this as an illegal and dangerous constitutional coup, but it soon became clear that the development could not be stopped and on December 21,1991, the leaders of 11 of the 15 constituent republics of the USSR met in Alma-Ata, Kazakhstan, and signed the charter, thus de facto ratifying the initial CIS treaty. The Soviet government had already recognized the independence of Estonia, Latvia, and Lithuania on September 6,1991, and the three Baltic nations as well as Georgia refused to join CIS. The CIS charter stated that all the members were sovereign and independent nations and thereby effectively abolished the USSR.

The 11 original member-states were Armenia, Azerbaijan,* Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan. In December 1993, Georgia also joined the CIS under somewhat controversial circumstances, following a civil war.

Between 2003 and 2005, the so called «colour revolutions» have been taking place in three CIS member states — Georgia, Ukraine and Kyrgyzstan. The official slogan of these revolutions was the democratization of the society. The new government and political leaders of these countries has taken a clearly pro-Western stance contrasted to their predecessors. And now we can see that Ukraine, Georgia and Kyrgyzstan are quietly drifting away from the CIS.

In that time frame a number of statements have been made by member state officials, casting doubt on the potential and continued worth of the CIS.