Signed 21 December 1991 Effective 21 December 1991 | ||
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Type Treaty establishing a founding declarations and principles of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS). Signatories Russia: Boris Yeltsin Ukraine: Leonid Kravchuk Belarus: Stanislav Shushkevich Armenia: Levon Ter-Petrosyan Azerbaijan: Ayaz Mutallibov Kazakhstan: Nursultan Nazarbayev Kyrgyzstan: Askar Akayev Moldova: Mircea Snegur Tajikistan: Rahmon Nabiyev Turkmenistan: Saparmurat Niyazov Uzbekistan: Islom Karimov | ||
The Alma-Ata Protocols are the founding declarations and principles of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).
The leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus had agreed to the Belavezha Accords on 8 December 1991, dissolving the Soviet Union and forming the CIS. On 21 December 1991, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova, Russia, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan, Ukraine, and Uzbekistan agreed to the Alma-Ata Protocols, joining the CIS. The latter agreement included the original three Belavezha signatories, as well as eight additional former Soviet republics.
More surprisingly, the protocol allowed the Russian Federation to assume Soviet Union's UN membership, including its permanent seat on the United Nations Security Council.