While Western countries only state about their intention to integrate post-Soviet states, including Armenia, Russian Prime Minister Vladimir Putin seems to have redoubled his efforts to collect former allies by forcing a majority of Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) countries to sign an agreement on the establishment of a free trade zone – a document that has just as much geopolitical as economic significance.

Eight of the 11 members of the CIS, a loose group of former Soviet nations formed as a forum for interaction after the demise of the Soviet Union, signed the agreement in St. Petersburg late on October 18. Those were Russia, Ukraine, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Armenia, Moldova and Tajikistan. Azerbaijan, Uzbekistan and Turkmenistan have asked for time until the end of the year to consider signing the document. The agreement contains clauses that restrict free, duty-free trade in certain types of goods, in particular limitations concern energy and metal exports.

Efforts to sign such an agreement had been futile for 17 years and the fact that it was “suddenly” signed suggest that “incentives or coercion” have been applied. Ever since the announcement, Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan and his government have been under pressure to answer questions on how an agreement like that could be signed without prior public discussions, without any hearings, without any consideration of all pros and cons. Perhaps, he will still be pressed for answers to these questions in front of the Armenian parliament.

Before that, however, he has already praised the agreement as a document of historic significance that creates exclusive opportunities for Armenia’s economy and businesses.

Ahead of the signing ceremony, Russian Prime Minister Putin himself said that his counterparts had achieved “a result surprising even for themselves”. The day before that, a source in the Russian government said that an agreement would be put for signing by the presidents at a CIS summit planned to be held in Moscow in December.

Meanwhile, the Armenian parliament will have to answer whether Armenia wants the revival of the Soviet Union. The accelerated pace with which Putin is approaching interaction with former Soviet countries at once brings in mind the ambitious task that Putin himself recently stated in his article in the Izvestia newspaper -- the establishment of a Eurasian Union that in the West is already considered to be an attempt at recreating the Soviet Union.

Some observers say that a major document that determines the vector of Armenia’s development and blocks the road to integration processes in other directions has been signed. Concerns linger as to whether this agreement will again deprive Armenia of Western investments, in particular, France’s construction of a new nuclear power plant and foreign investment in the North-South railroad -- investment that could change the local business environment and cause the leadership to reform the social and economic structure of Armenia. Armenia might also lose the chance to integrate into the international community and remain a “satellite” in the pro-Russian space for decades to come.