Pashinyan: Armenia complies with sanctions imposed on Russia
YEREVAN, July 24. /ARKA/. When it comes to Western sanctions imposed against Russia Armenia is closely in touch and cooperate with the EU special envoy and the representative of the US, to make sure that we act as a responsible member of the international community, Armenian PM Nikol Pashinayn said in a last week interview with the Caucasus bureau of Agence France-Presse (AFP).
‘It may seem stange to you, but we are transparent on this point as well. We are a member of the Eurasian Economic Union, Russia is our main trading partner, and naturally, from the very first days we understood that the sanctions that are being imposed by the West and other countries upon Russia would create certain problems. We also understood that Russia will have expectations from us to help to the best of our ability in this difficult economic environment, because, imagine the volume of Armenia and the volume of Russia,’ Pashinyan said.
He added, ‘And we also understood that the West will be expecting that we help them, in complying with the sanctions. When talking with our Russian partners we said the following – we understand your expectation and we stand ready to address, to meet your expectation, but up to the point at which Armenia would face the threat of sanctions, because if an endless country like Russia can perhaps afford to face the sanctions, but Armenia, especially in this military-political environment, cannot afford anything like that. And this is also the same text that we communicated to the West, as proven by the fact that I am saying this in front of cameras.
This is the rule that we follow. Of course, there are known forces that always want to and they are lobbying the American and European press to make it look like that Armenia is a black hole in that sense, but currently, on the official level we do not have any objections or complaints by the European or American partners, or by Russia, because we do not want to play tricky games with our partners, we are saying this clearly and our position is legitimate.
This is not to say that everything is perfect. There is another thing that the sanctions regime often changes, and in reality, even if something had to be done, it wouldn’t necessarily be done by the government. It is the private sector that is moving goods around. We are doing our best to make sure that everything is done in accordance with the rule that I just mentioned. It’s my opinion and also the opinion of our international partners that we are able to do this and we will continue to dօ this.’ -0-
