DUSHANBE, November 12, 2008, Asia-Plus — Uzbekistan’s intention to withdraw from the Eurasian Economic Community (EAEC) is quite predictable step, Shokirjon Haikmov, lecturer with Tajik International University, said, commenting on reports by some media on Uzbekistan’s intention to withdraw from the EAEC.
According to him, relations of Uzbekistan with the West, including the United States, improved lately. “The European Union countries and the United States have suspended sanctions, introduced against Uzbekistan following the 2005 Ferghana events, for a certain period in connection with alleged improvement of the human rights situation in the country,” Shokirjon Hakimov said, adding that against backcloth of strained relations between the West and Russia this decision of the Uzbek authorities is evidence of the fact that official Tashkent “is changing its foreign policy priorities in favor of the West.”
“In my opinion, regional organizations active within the CIS area, including the EAEC, are inoperative and inefficient, giving priority to foreign political components rather than to the socioeconomic ones,” Tajik expert said.
News agencies Regnum and Ferghana.ru as well as newspaper
Kommersant
reported that Uzbekistan was going to stop membership in the EAEC.
Kommersant
, in particular, noted that the reasons for such action are not clear, but this decision was made after the EU suspended sanctions against Uzbekistan.
The initial concept of the Eurasian Economic Community (EAEC) was first proposed in October 2000, as a successor to the CIS Customs Union, when Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Russia, and Tajikistan signed a treaty on broad economic and trade cooperation. The organization was formally created with the ratification of that treaty in May 2001. The initial five-member group was further expanded in May 2002 when Moldova and Ukraine were granted observer status, and again in April 2003, when Ukraine and Armenia gained observer status. Uzbekistan joined the EAEC in 2006.
