The leaders of former Soviet states signed a bevy of agreements during three separate inter-state gatherings held recently in the Tajik capital of Dushanbe. Despite the move toward greater integration on paper, it remains uncertain to what extent the agreements will be implemented.

The main event in Dushanbe was the Commonwealth of Independent States summit on October 5. In all, the summit produced 17 agreements. Among the most prominent deals signed were a framework for the regulation of labor migration, and a pact aiming to promote the civil rights of migrants. Other agreements were designed to stimulate free trade among CIS states.

On October 6, two separate meetings occurred – a session of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) Security Council, and a summit of Eurasian Economic Cooperation (EEC) organization.

During the CSTO gathering, Russian President Vladimir Putin offered member states an incentive to tighten security cooperation, announcing that Russia was prepared to sell advanced military hardware to neighboring states at "Russian domestic prices." In return for discounted arms sales, Moscow expressed a desire for other CSTO member states – Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – to take a more active role in international peacekeeping. The CSTO chief, Nikolai Bordyuzha, suggested that a CSTO peacekeeping force could be deployed in the separatist Georgian territories of Abkhazia and South Ossetia. "Peacekeeping forces will act according to a verbal agreement with the United Nations, and will be used according to decisions made by the [CSTO] council," Bordyuzha said.

In addition, the CSTO signed a cooperation agreement with another regional institution – the Shanghai Cooperation Organization, of which Russia and China are the leading members. Overall, Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan are members of both groups. The agreement would appear to enhance China's security leverage in Central Asia.

"The documents signed in Dushanbe give a very serious impulse to the development of the organization [CSTO]," Bordyuzha said.

The EEC leaders, meanwhile, agreed to establish a fully functioning customs union by 2011. Three states – Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan – will be the founding members of the customs union. Three other states – Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Uzbekistan – intend to join the union after meeting various accession conditions. Participants are now expected to establish a commission on customs regulations, and harmonize trade-related legislation.

Putin hailed the results of the Dushanbe meetings as a significant step forward for inter-state cooperation. "We have made a principally new step in the development of the processes of the post-Soviet area," Putin said.

For all the agreements, however, the three meetings in Dushanbe proved that it is impossible to satisfy all CIS member states. Azerbaijan, for example, expressed concern on October 8 that Russia's offer to sell discounted weapons could be exploited by Armenia to engage in an arms build-up that would complicate the search for a Nagorno-Karabakh peace settlement. [For background see the Eurasia Insight archive]. "We hope that Russia will take into account all sensitive issues while taking these kinds of steps," Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry spokesman Khazar Ibrahim said during a news briefing in Baku.

Meanwhile, Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili declared that the CIS had not served Georgia's interests, and refused to sign a development concept paper.

Even Tajikistan, the host for the meetings, suffered its fair share of disappointment. Tajik President Imomali Rahmon pressed his fellow CIS leaders to explore agreements on sharing increasingly scarce water resources. Rahmon's initiatives did not gain traction, however. Only Kyrgyzstan, which like Tajikistan, is a primary source nation for water supplies, strongly backed Rahmon's call for the establishment of a water-use framework. Uzbekistan, another of Tajikistan's neighbors, is believed to oppose the initiative.

The inability to cooperate on water usage could soon emerge as a regional security issue in Central Asia, said Tajik scientist Sabit Negmatullayev, a former president of the Tajik Academy of Sciences. "To ensure its energy security, Tajikistan intends to build two hydropower cascades on the Vakhsh River (in central Tajikistan) and on the Zeravshan River (in the North of the country)," Negmatullayev said. "The downstream countries, whose populations grow rapidly, [i.e. Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan], suffer from seasonal shortages of water so badly needed for irrigation. Having appropriate agreements in place, we could ensure stable discharge of water in the region, i.e. a fair distribution of precious resources, which are seen very often as a potential bone of contention."