The Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) is a regional intergovernmental organization comprising states of the former Soviet Union, formed after the collapse of the union in December 1991. Its origins trace to the Belovezha Accords, signed by the leaders of Russia, Ukraine, and Belarus on December 8, 1991, and it formally came into being on December 21, 1991, when the founding agreement was expanded to include the Central Asian republics, the Transcaucasian republics, and Moldova, per Encyclopaedia Britannica. The Baltic states declined to join. Minsk serves as the CIS’s administrative center, with its Executive Committee also maintaining an office in Moscow. The organization coordinates member states’ economic, foreign, defense, immigration, environmental, and law-enforcement policy through a council of heads of state and government. Georgia finalized its withdrawal in August 2009 following its 2008 war with Russia, and Ukraine formally withdrew in 2018 after Russia’s annexation of Crimea. In October 2025, the CIS Heads of State Council granted the Shanghai Cooperation Organization observer status at a Dushanbe meeting, citing shared positions on counterterrorism, trade, and international law.