Ukraine Terminates 116 Agreements with Russia Belarus and CIS
ISTANBUL – Ukraine has officially terminated 116 agreements with Russia, Belarus, and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the country’s Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha announced on Thursday.
Posting on the US social media platform Facebook, Sybiha said Ukraine’s legal and treaty framework “must reflect the realities of war and the new security architecture on the European continent.”
Breakdown of Terminated Agreements
According to the Foreign Minister, Ukraine’s Cabinet of Ministers approved the termination on Wednesday. The move includes:
- Terminating 25 agreements
- Denouncing 3 agreements
- Withdrawing from 88 international treaties
Of these agreements, 5 were with Russia, 23 with Belarus, 87 within the CIS framework, and 1 was a trilateral agreement between Ukraine, Russia, and Belarus.
Sybiha emphasized that this action represents the “main stage” of aligning Ukraine’s bilateral and multilateral relations with the current realities of war. He added that it strengthens Kyiv’s position in Europe’s new security architecture.
“This is my principled position as minister — to eliminate everything that could weaken Ukraine, to cut off connections with the aggressor state, and to build a strategic long-term defense for the free world along Ukraine’s eastern border and beyond,” Sybiha said.
Context on the CIS
The CIS was founded in 1991 after the dissolution of the Soviet Union to encourage cooperation in economic, political, and security matters. Full members include Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, and Uzbekistan, while Turkmenistan holds associate membership.
Although Ukraine was a founding state, it never ratified the CIS charter and was never a full member. Kyiv withdrew from CIS statutory bodies in 2018.
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