Russia and Belarus have some of the closest relations in the post-Soviet space. Both are members of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), and the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU). And together, the two countries make up the Union State. Their political and economic interests are not identical however, and divergences have appeared since Russia’s March 2014 annexation of Crimea. Belarus famously declined to participate in Russia’s counter-sanctions, developed in response to those imposed by the United States and the European Union over Russia’s Ukrainian policy; and more recently, Minsk has lent only tepid diplomatic …read more
Source: The Jamestown Foundation