Turkmenistan: CIS Powwow Features Russian-Turkmen Horseplay: A meeting of CIS government heads over the weekend came and went with little media attention, an indicator both of the lack of importance prime ministers are accorded in the former Soviet Union and of the organization’s general redundancy. Conceived to keep the newly independent states of the former Soviet Union together in a loose confederation, the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) had lost much of its mojo even before one-time member Georgia departed in 2008 and fresher affiliations – such as the Shanghai Cooperation Organization and Moscow’s Eurasian Economic Union – began gathering geopolitical prominence. The CIS now includes Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan as full members, with Turkmenistan and Ukraine as participants. As Russian President Vladimir Putin said in 2005, the organization is best conceived as “a civilized divorce” between former partners, in spite of periodic and half-hearted attempts to turn it into something more. For that reason, even the CIS Summit of Heads of Government on November 21 and 22 in Ashgabat had a damp squib feel to it. Although Turkmen President Gurbanguly Berdymukhamedov was there to greet delegates and hold bilateral talks, the Turkmen, Azeri and Uzbek delegations were formally represented by their respective deputy prime ministers. Ukraine and Moldova, meanwhile, sent ambassadors to head up low-key delegations. read more eurasianet.org/node/71066
Posted on: Mon, 24 Nov 2014 09:27:08 +0000