Russian President Vladimir Putin and his colleagues from Kazakhstan and Belarus on Thursday signed a deal forming an Eurasian Union between the three states, a move that analysts say deepens Russia’s alienation from the West.
Putin praised the treaty as “historically significant” because it raises economic cooperation between member states to unprecedent levels. “The practice has shown that this is advantageous for each of us,” he said in comments broadcast on television after the signing ceremony in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan.
He explained that Union members would have a common labour market and aim to create a single financial market and harmonize currency markets.
The Eurasian Union is supposed to replace the Customs Union between the three countries in January 2015. Armenia and Kyrgyzstan have said that they want to join later this year.
Moscow has touted the Customs Union as a rival political integration vehicle to the European Union, which also originated as a free trade organization. It has already formed an Eurasian Commission, a Moscow-based executive body that resembles the EU Commission.
Relations between Russia and the EU have plummeted after the crisis in Ukraine, which started in November when then-president Viktor Yanukovych refused to sign a trade and association treaty with Brussels, leading to accusations by the EU and the United States that Russia was exerting pressure.
After Yanukovych’s ouster during mass protests in February, Moscow accused the West of staging a coup in Ukraine. The West, in turn, imposed sanctions against Russia for the annexation of Crimea and its alleged backing of pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine.
Critics point out that the Eurasian Union is proving popular only with undemocratic countries that are dependent on Russia.
Kazakhstan has been governed by authoritarian President Nursultan Nazerbayev since 1991, while Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, in office since 1994, has been dubbed “Europe’s last dictator.” Armenia made a volte-face in autumn when it said that it would not sign an EU association agreement and will seek Customs Union membership instead.
Putin claimed on Thursday that the Eurasian Union was attractive.
“Everywhere I go, everybody I talk to, they all ask me: How can we get our relations with the Eurasian Union going?” he said.
But Kazakh President Nursultan Nazerbayev and Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko in their speeches both noted that negotiations in the run-up to Thursday’s signing had not been easy.
“Today a new geoeconomic reality of the 21st century is being born. It has been created with great difficulties,” Nazarbayev said. Lukashenko also spoke of “long and very complicated” negotiations.
The treaty’s signing “is not the end but the beginning of the process during which we must show that we made the right steps,” he said.