PUTIN: EVERYONE IRRESPECTIVE OF DOMESTIC POLITICAL SLANT INTERESTED IN RETAINING CIS

PanARMENIAN.Net - «If someone expected special achievements from the CIS in economy, political and military cooperation, this could have not been the case,» Russian President Vladimir Putin stated at a joint press conference with the Armenian leader in Yerevan today. In his words, the CIS was formed for the processes of USSR collapse to take place in a more civilized way, as mildly as possible, with minimal economic and humanitarian losses. The CIS has managed to meet these tasks. The CIS has never had an economic super-task, Putin noted. "Thus many things the citizens of our countries expected were not fulfilled, as no one ever actually worked at it. Now within the framework of the EurAsEC, being created within the common economic space elements of actual integration cooperation appear, principles of actual economic integration are being laid down. This is quite different a case. Then it comes out that while someone is not ready to such steps, another one shows explicit interest to it. Thus I hope for new integration communities to be formed on this new voluntary basis of integration," the Russian President added. As of the CIS, it is a rather useful club for mutual information, clearing out problematic issues of common political, humanitarian and administrative nature. «We should not lose this tool, as the scope of interaction between the CIS countries is very wide, the interdependency of our economies if extremely high. Thus numerous problems arise irrespective of many deeper integration processes, which are under way within the EurAsEC and common economic space. CIS is an arena, at which state leaders can routinely meet and discuss problems. I believe that undoubtedly the CIS should be retained, and everyone irrespective of the domestic political slant is interested in it,» he noted. In Putin's words, if the EU has been formed for the goal of unification, the CIS - for a civilized divorce. «This is the difference. All other things are political husk and chatter,» he added. In his turn Robert Kocharian noted that the CIS is a good ground for solving various issues. «The conversations on reforms issue from certain pessimism regarding the future of the CIS. There is a false belief that after a reform the CIS will become something like the EU. Problems appear from constant comparison of the CIS with the EU, of which the CIS will always lose. One should not evaluate the CIS within the plane of such comparison. The level of integration is quite different there. We should be happy with what we have and that there is an opportunity to gather and solve problems,» the Armenian President added.