Medvedev: Georgia Gained Nothing from Quitting CIS
Civil Georgia, Tbilisi / 11 Dec.'10 / 00:46

Russia's President, Dmitry Medvedev, said on December 10, that by quitting Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) Georgia failed to gain anything and lost "a forum" to simultaneously communicate with most of the post-Soviet states. 

"There will always be certain problems in the activities of CIS. But we have no other forum for agreeing our interests on the scale of almost entire post-Soviet space," Medvedev said in his opening remarks at a news conference after the summit of CIS leaders in Moscow.

"Those who left this forum - in this case I mean Georgia - have hardly gained anything. They have no opportunity to interact with all the countries together and part of agreements [within CIS] has become invalid for them," he said and added that this "negative" example of Georgia proved CIS's ability "to regulate relations between the state."

Georgia was the latest country to decide joining CIS in December, 1993 and the first one to officially quit the organization in which 11 former Soviet states remain now.

President Saakashvili first announced about the intention to quit the organization on August 12, 2008, just after the active phase of military hostilities with Russia were over. He described the decision as "saying farewell to the Soviet Union."

Georgia formally quit the organization on August 18, 2009 after year-long formal procedures required for leaving CIS were completed.

According to the Georgian Foreign Ministry, despite withdrawal from the organization Georgia still remained part of 75 multilateral agreements the participation in which is not conditional on CIS membership, including on visa-free movement and free trade between most of the organization member states.

Civil.Ge © 2001-2024