Founding of Eurasian Economic Union

The Eurasian Economic Union is an economic bloc of countries of the former Soviet Union, created to promote the free movement of goods, capital, services and labour. The idea was first put forward by Kazakhstan's president Nursultan Nazarbayev in a speech in Moscow in 1994, and led first to a customs union between Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan. The union itself was established by a treaty signed in Astana in 2014 and came into force in 2015, and Armenia and Kyrgyzstan joined it. It has a common external tariff and a commission based in Moscow. Critics see it as a vehicle for Russian influence in the region.

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