Leading Article: Back in the USSR

Less than five years after the Soviet Union's collapse, Russia is taking steps to bring as many former Soviet republics as possible back under its wing. Last Friday, President Boris Yeltsin and the leaders of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan signed a treaty creating a "community of integrated states". Yesterday, Russia and Belarus went even further, establishing a union that is intended to have a common foreign and defence policy, a single currency, united transport and energy systems and much more.

Mr Yeltsin contends that this agreement does not undermine the sovereignty of Belarus. He even suggests it will merely create a sort of Eurasian equivalent of the European Union. He is fooling no one. This will be a Moscow-led union. Only token symbols of independence will be left to Belarus if the treaty is implemented in full.

The larger issue is whether the latest accords are but a prelude to a Russian attempt to recreate the Soviet Union or - since history never exactly repeats itself - a new union of states subservient to Moscow. This is not as implausible a prospect as it seemed even six months ago. Restoring the Soviet Union is one of the central ingredients in the programme of Gennady Zyuganov, the Communist leader who is poised to defeat Mr Yeltsin in June's presidential elections.

Mr Yeltsin's eagerness to rush through the treaties can be interpreted as an attempt to steal as much of Mr Zyuganov's electoral thunder as possible. But it is not just a tactical ploy. It is certainly not economically inspired: a reconstituted union would probably cost Moscow money. Like most Russians, Mr Yeltsin has never found it easy to embrace the idea that states such as Ukraine, Belarus and Kazakhstan, where ethnic Russians have lived for generations, should be genuinely independent. It is no accident that Russians coined the term "the near abroad" to describe the former Soviet republics. The phrase implies a unilateral Russian right to circumscribe the independence of these states.

Still, we must not lose sight of the fact that Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan signed the new treaties freely and without Russian coercion. Belarus has never developed a strong sense of separate nationhood and, in the absence of firm Western support for its independence, it was virtually inevitable that it would drift back under Russia's shadow. Kazakhstan, with a large ethnic Russian community in northern regions bordering Russia, and a potentially meddlesome China to its east, has good reasons to forge closer links with Moscow. It also makes economic sense for the former Soviet republics of Central Asia to deepen their ties with Russia.

So far, so good. But in other parts of the former Soviet Union, Russia has applied pressure on independent states to dilute their sovereignty. This is particularly true in Transcaucasia, where the Kremlin manipulated internal political and ethnic disputes to bring Azerbaijan and Georgia back into a Moscow-led fold. Last year Russia persuaded Armenia and Georgia to grant it the right to maintain military bases on their soil. In Moldova, which borders Ukraine, Russia agreed to pull out its troops. But it would like to keep a military presence there as a way of reminding Ukraine never to threaten Russia's interests.

Clearly, Russia's leaders suffer from a temptation to exert pressure on neighbours whose independence they have not fully come to terms with. The West must make it clear to the Russian leadership that such pressure will be wholly unacceptable if it is used to coerce the Ukraine into joining the Russia-Belarus union. The Ukraine is of much greater significance than other states that have already drifted back towards Moscow. It has a population of more than 50 million and prodigious agricultural resources. Ukraine's leaders show no sign of wanting their state to be transformed into a satellite of Moscow. They must be free to decide their country's destiny.

This is equally true for the Baltic states and the former Communist countries of eastern Europe. In an extraordinary and rather alarming remark last Friday, Mr Yeltsin suggested that Bulgaria, Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania could sign the treaty uniting Russia, Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan. Perhaps he had a memory lapse: the independence of eastern Europe is absolutely not up for discussion. If he did forget, Western leaders should remind him of this point as politely, but firmly, as possible.