The Commonwealth of Independent States CIS is an international organisation comprised of 12 sovereign states of former-Soviet Union. The genesis of the CIS dates back to 8 December 1991, thus 2001 heralded the tenth anniversary of this sui generis organisation. Although a decade elapsed, one vvould tentatively argue that the CIS is far from being a solidified structure vvhereby to further the interests of member states. To depict the loopholes vvithin this structure, this paper is constructed on three layers: First, to introduce the reader the basic structure of the CIS. Secondly, to assess the legal status of the CIS and to ansvver to vvhat extent the CIS has acquired a firm basis in international lavv and finally to dravv lessons from the institutional mistakes made in the advancement a new regional organisation. Portraying this is important inasmuch as the failure of this integration model might prevent similar mistakes from being repeated in the sub-regional integration models.