Putin signs treaty on Eurasian Economic Union into law

, Oct 4: Russian President

on Friday signed into law the treaty on establishing Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) after the parliament of

ratified the pact late last month.

Russia thus became the first of the three EEU proposing member states to have completed all legal procedures needed for the start of the proposed new union as scheduled for Jan 1, 2015, Xinhua reported.

The creation of Eurasian Economic Union, a European Union (EU)-style alliance, was proposed and agreed upon in May when the three heads of state from Belarus, Kazakhstan and Russia met at a summit held in Astana, the capital of Kazakhstan. And the agreement forging EEU was inked by Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko, Kazakh President Nursultan Nazarbayev and Russian President Vladimir Putin.

EEU is designed with the mission to facilitate the free flow of people, capital and goods within the three countries and is also aimed at boosting ties among them, which are already part of a customs union created in 2010 to build a free trade rival to the 28-nation EU.

The proposed EEU is expected to involve more republics of the former Soviet Union, such as Armenia and Kyrgyzstan.

"Today I signed a federal law on the ratification of the treaty on the EEU," Putin said before a government meeting, hailing the act of signing as "a significant stage" in the joint work on integration with Russia's closest partners and allies, Belarus and Kazakhstan.

IANS