168: What is Nikol Pashinyan hiding?

Before the elections, Nikol Pashinyan promised that immediately after being elected, he would go to Moscow and in a few days he would solve all the problems related to the export of Armenian goods to the Russian market.

1 month after the elections, after all, Nikol Pashinyan went to Russia, participated in the international industrial exhibition held in Yekaterinburg, met with the Russian Prime Minister (the meeting with the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Putin did not take place), but the Russian market, as before, remains inaccessible for Armenian products.

Despite this, Nikol Pashinyan assures that agreements have been reached within the framework of EAEU regarding the lifting of restrictions for Armenia. And what arrangements are we talking about, he avoids detailing.

Nikol Pashinyan, who is ready to present the non-existent thing as a reality, is extremely tight-lipped regarding the agreements reached during his visit to Russia and meetings. Not only was he in no hurry to please his electorate with the results of the visit, but he is also in no hurry to reveal the agreements reached. He says that it is too early to publish concrete results before their practical implementation begins.

What is the reason for Nikol Pashinyan’s caution is not known. But his behavior proves that the agreements reached are very fragile, and it is not clear when they will be implemented.

And until then, producers continue to suffer big losses. Attempts are being made to deliver Armenian agricultural products to other markets, but the results are very small. After the closure of the Russian market, Armenia managed to export barely a few hundred tons of pepper, a few hundred tons of tomatoes, a few hundred tons of cherries, and so on. Last year, when there were no problems related to the export to the Russian market, the exports of these and other agricultural products reached thousands, even tens of thousands of tons.

Even government subsidies do not change much. In June, they spent 3.1 billion drams on subsidizing exports, but there are no tangible results.

And while they are unable to solve the problems of exporting Armenian products in other markets, Nikol Pashinyan invented something new. He says that we have a large flow of passengers to Armenia, those people come and consume Armenian agricultural products inside. It also exports.

It seems that before, tourists did not come to Armenia and did not consume agricultural products, only this year, by eating apricots, tourists have become “exporters” of apricots.

It is also not the case that this year we have such huge flows of tourists that eating apricots in Armenia, they started to “export” apricots in larger quantities. This is also where Nikol Pashinyan manipulates reality.

Since the agricultural harvest season starts mostly in June, here are the tourism figures for June. In June of this year, 216,214 tourists came to Armenia. In the same month last year, 215,253 tourists came.

The number of tourists increased by only 961 compared to last year.

Where are those large passenger flows that Nikol Pashinyan is talking about?

Even if they were, no tourist consumption can replace real exports. The fact shows that at the moment the potential market for the export of Armenian agricultural products is Russia. But the Russian market remains closed for Armenian agricultural products, even after Nikol Pashinyan’s visit to the Russian Federation and the “confidential” agreements reached.

Until the attitude of the Armenian authorities on some sensitive issues changes, no agreement will become a reality. Apart from the well-known contradictions related to foreign orientations, during the meeting with Nikol Pashinyan, the Russian Prime Minister made it very clear that the attitude of the authorities towards the Russian business operating in Armenia is not acceptable for Russia, that the rights and legal interests of the Russian business must be respected.

“It is important that the Armenian government continues to create a comfortable environment for Russian investors and ensure that their rights and legitimate interests are respected,” the Russian Prime Minister stated without further ado.

Who was the Russian Prime Minister referring to by this? To get the answer to this question, it is necessary to see which Russian investors’ rights and legal interests are not respected in Armenia.

It is obvious that it first of all refers to the HEC. Although HETC belongs to the big Armenian businessman Samvel Karapetyan, in this case we are dealing with Russian capital. Everyone knows what artificial problems the Armenian authorities have created in connection with the HEP, by what means they are trying to take it away from the owner, to what extent the investor’s rights and legal interests have been preserved.

There are other companies with the participation of Russian capital, for which the authorities are trying to create problems. One of those companies is the railway, which has been handed over to the Russian concession management, but the authorities, for various reasons, intend to take back the concession and hand it over to another country.

It is difficult to say to what extent the concerns voiced regarding the protection of the rights and interests of Russian capital were acceptable to the Armenian side. But it is a fact that immediately after the return of Nikol Pashinyan from Russia, the process of recognizing the ETC as a priority interest was postponed.

Could these two circumstances be directly related to each other, of course, it is impossible to rule it out. But time will tell.

Time will also show what “confidential” agreements Nikol Pashinyan has reached regarding the lifting of restrictions on the export of Armenian agricultural products in Russia, which he stubbornly avoids making public, despite the fact that thousands of producers are eagerly waiting for it.

HAKOB KOCHARYAN

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