Eurasian Union agreement to be signed in the end of May

The signing of the agreement creating the Eurasian Economic Union will occur in 2014, laying the groundwork for its launch next year, reported on April 3 Erlan Idrysov, the foreign minister of Kazakhstan. “A very important meeting is expected at the end of this month in Minsk, following by a summit of the troika in Astana at the end of May, where we have the intention of competing the formal work of this document,” he told the RIA Novosti news agency. The troika refers to the Russian Federation, Kazakhstan and Belarus.

Zenon Zawada: The Russian government is currently aiming to include as much of Ukraine as possible in the Eurasian Economic Union by sponsoring the current federalism campaigns in the country’s southeastern regions. The goal is to include Ukraine’s southeastern regions, represented by separatist leaders, even if Kyiv’s pro-EU government refuses Eurasian membership. We estimate the likelihood of the fulfillment of this plan as 50/50, given that a military invasion of southeastern Ukraine remains a real possibility, as confirmed by top NATO officials this week