Armenian chief travels to Russia regardless of tensions and guarantees financial bloc cooperation
TALLINN, Estonia (AP) — Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, whose nation’s relations with Russia grew tense this yr, mentioned Monday that when Armenia takes the rotating chairmanship of a Moscow-dominated financial alliance he’ll attempt to suppress politics obstructing regional integration.
Armenia is to change into the chairman nation of the Eurasian Financial Union in 2024. The bloc, established in 2014, consists of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan together with Russia and Armenia and encourages the free motion of products and providers.
Pashinyan previously yr has offended Russia by refusing to permit a Moscow-led safety alliance to carry workout routines in Armenia and by declining to attend an alliance summit.
Russia additionally was angered when Armenia joined the Treaty of Rome, which established the Worldwide Legal Court docket that has issued an arrest warrant for Russian President Vladimir Putin on expenses of battle crimes for deportation of youngsters throughout the battle with Ukraine.
Nonetheless, Pashinyan attended a gathering of the union’s Supreme Council in St. Petersburg on Monday.
The union “and its financial ideas mustn’t correlate with political ambitions,” Pashinyan mentioned on the assembly. Armenia is “attempting to suppress all makes an attempt to politicize Eurasian integration.”
Armenia is extremely depending on Russian commerce and hosts a Russian army base, however relations deteriorated previously yr as a Russian peacekeeping power did not unblock the street main from Armenia to the ethnic Armenian Nagorno-Karabakh region of Azerbaijan.
Azerbaijan took full management of the area in a lightning offensive in September.
