EEU might adopt common currency unit, director of the EEU’s financial policy department says

If the task of introducing wider use of the national currencies of the three member states is solved successfully, then the issue of a common currency unit might be raised.

In the Monday issue of the Rossiiskaya Gazeta newspaper Bembya Khulkhachiyev, director of the Eurasian Economic Union’s financial policy department, said that the Union was planning to make a wider use of the national currencies of the three member states with an eye to create a common payment system, ITAR-TASS quotes him saying. If these tasks are solved successfully, the issue of a common currency unit might be raised, he said.

Currently, the Eurasian Economic Union, according to Khulkhachiyev, makes 50% of internal settlements in rubles, 40% - in U.S. dollars, eight to nine percent - in euros. The share of other currencies barely reaches one percent.

Processes of financial integration within the Eurasian Economic Union “are especially important now that the European Union and the United States have imposed sanctions against Russia’s financial sector - Sberbank, VTB, VEB, Gazprombank and Rosselkhozbank,” the Rossiiskaya Gazeta notes.

As “EuroBelarus” Information Service earlier reported, Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan three countries signed a Eurasian Economic Union Treaty in May 2014. The Union is to supersede the Common Economic Space of Belarus, Russia and Kazakhstan on January 1, 2015The three countries signed a Eurasian Economic Union Treaty in May 2014. The Union is to supersede the Common Economic Space of Belarus, Russia and Kazakhstan on January 1, 2015. Two more countries of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS), Armenia and Kyrgyzstan, have announced their plans to join the Union.