"Real life has confirmed the rightfulness of the CIS development concept
supported by Ukraine," said Borys Tarasiuk, Ukrainian Foreign Minister,
in his speech at the Russian Diplomatic Academy. According to him, the
CIS will have a future only if favorable conditions for cooperation are
created including "clubs of common interests" and not as an afterthought.
If this is not an expressed in diplomatic language epitaph to the strange
creature which is now seven years old, then it is an obituary. Seven years
in the so-called Commonwealth allowed us not to forget the fact that we
used to be a united country not long ago. For the presidents of the fragments
of the former USSR, CIS summits have become something in between Politburo
sessions in the USSR's final days, where there were not even common interests,
and a school reunion: they came, saw each other, and walked away. For functionaries
it is a chance to get an easy and well-paid job with opportunities to establish
business contacts. For Communists - a substitute for paradise lost. And
for the population of the twelve countries the Commonwealth with each passing
day becomes simply more and more empty words. Especially for Tajikistan
which is in war now, for Armenia and Azerbaijan where the war is now in
a cold phase, for Georgia and Moldova with unconquered separatism. As a
matter of fact, there is nothing to feel sorry about. Thus, there need
be no surprise that not a single word is spoken about some priorities or
the strategic importance of the country's participation in the CIS in the
draft of the Ukrainian government program. The various CIS meetings, forums,
and summits have long commanded only scarce coverage in the Ukrainian press.
Except that Berezovsky still travels actively and interacts with the
presidents, submitting his projects for their consideration. In particular,
Kuchma "approved in general" his ideas. However, it can be seen that he
is interested first and foremost in the possibilities for privatization
in the post-Soviet geographical theater.
It is already clear that somebody is more interested in the Russia-Belarus
union with its Great Russian rhetoric and vague future; somebody like Ukraine
is interested in the Georgia-Ukraine-Azerbaijan-Moldova understanding with
a palpable aroma of oil, while others are closer to the Asian tea-house.
It is clear that it was not even Kyiv that torpedoed with the perfidious
West's help Russia's attempts to revive a multilingual empire, now significantly
narrowed. As this is written not only in the Communists press: it did not
and could not have happened.
It is clear the Ukraine's striving toward Europe already little depends
personally on President Kuchma and Foreign Minister Tarasiuk considered
Ukraine's main Eurocentrists. Russia has shown several times in recent
why it is not worth establishing a united country centered in Moscow.
It seems that we are beginning to understand where to go. It also seems
that there will be no funeral of the Commonwealth of the Independent States
because it in fact was never born.






