General Secretary of the CIS

The General Secretary of the Commonwealth of Independent States (formerly known as the Executive Secretary) is the head of the CIS Executive Committee, the central body which has served the CIS since its establishment in 1991. The headquarters of the secretary-general, as with the committee, is in Minsk, Belarus.

History
The position was created in 1994, replacing the President of the Soviet Union.

In late 2022, it was announced that the position's formal title will be changed. By the decision of the Council of Heads of State on 1 January 2023, the formal title of Chairman of the Executive Committee – CIS Executive Secretary was changed to CIS General Secretary.

Executive committee
The general secretary leads the executive committee (Исполнительном комитете), and all Secretariat staff are answerable to them. He is supported by four deputy general secretaries:


 * Leonid Anfimov (First Deputy)
 * Dauren Abaev
 * Ilkhom Nematov
 * Denis Trefilov

It is the single permanent executive, administrative and coordinating body of the CIS The CIS Executive Committee organizes its work in close cooperation with the Council of Permanent Plenipotentiary Representatives among other bodies of the CIS. On 2 April 1999, the Council of Heads of State decided to reorganize the CIS Executive Secretariat, the apparatus of the Interstate Economic Committee, and other departments into a single permanent executive body: the CIS Executive Committee Independent States, the legal successor of the CIS Executive Secretariat. The council on 21 June 2000, approved the Regulations on the executive committee.

List of secretaries-general
The work of CIS is coordinated by the General Secretary.