168: The main issue of the Pashinyan-Putin meeting: what will the Russian side answer?

Nikol Pashinyan is going to go on a working visit to the Russian Federation on April 1. According to the RA Government, Pashinyan’s meeting with Vladimir Putin will take place in Moscow as part of the visit.

The other day, on March 23, it became known that Pashinyan-Putin had a telephone conversation. From the message of the official Russian Kremlin, it became clear that the initiator of the conversation was the Armenian side.

According to the announcement of the RA government, the interlocutors discussed issues related to the scope of the bilateral agenda and agreed to continue the discussion in the format of a meeting on the next convenient occasion.

A few days later, in the briefing following the Government session, Nikol Pashinyan stated that he had requested a meeting with the President of the Russian Federation, and the issue of transferring the South Caucasian railway concession to a third party was discussed. “I am the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia and I know what kind of state the Russian Federation is, what kind of state the USA, France, Germany, and the EU are. You know, usually I ask them for a meeting and not the other way around, and that’s normal. Yes, I ask everyone to meet, and it is absolutely neither shameful nor humiliating,” he said.

Pashinyan noted that he does not remember such a meeting being initiated and not at his request. Turning to the question of whether he confirms that he raised the issue of transferring the concession of the South Caucasian Railway to a third party during the telephone conversation with Putin, Pashinyan stated that there is no deadline.

“But it’s not like it’s indefinite, we hope to find a solution to that partnership issue.”

Does it confirm that the issue of transferring the concession to the Kazakh company is being discussed? Pashinyan answered. “There is a mutual understanding between us and the Russian Federation, and the Kazakh company is acceptable to both of us… But the partners of the Russian Federation have not yet said: “Okay, we agree, let’s do this”.

Back in February, it became known that Pashinyan wants Russia to hand over the management of South Caucasian railways to a third country. He emphasized: “Due to Russia’s management of the revenue stream, we are losing our strategic positions and losing our competitive advantage.” “The solution I imagine is that such a country, which has friendly relations with both Russia and Armenia, directly buys the right of concession management from Russia,” he added.

Basically, we are talking about Kazakhstan, which has close cooperation with Azerbaijan, recently there are tendencies to close relations with Armenia as well, Kazakhstan also has normal relations with the Russian Federation.

However, the Russian Foreign Ministry considered Pashinyan’s proposal strange. Maria Zakharova, the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry, said that the railway network of Armenia has been under the management of the “South Caucasus Railways” company for more than 20 years. He informed that during that time, the Russian company not only steadily fulfills its concession obligations, but also invests significant funds in order to modernize infrastructure and rolling stock.

“In Yerevan, however, they seem to have forgotten about this,” said the spokesperson of the Russian Foreign Ministry.

According to Maria Zakharova, “the Russian railway operator is the structure that does not deprive Armenia of competitive opportunities, but creates them.”

“As for our approach to the restoration of the two sections of the Armenian railways, going to Azerbaijan and Turkey, at the request of Yerevan, it was clearly expressed by Russian Deputy Prime Minister Alexey Overchuk on February 12. We will remain loyal to that point of view,” said the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry. As early as February, Yerevan appealed to Moscow to restore certain railway sections, to which Russian Deputy Prime Minister Overchuk responded positively.

168.amin a conversation with Russian analyst Konstantin Simonov said that despite the foreign policy of EU integration, which has an uncertain future, the Republic of Armenia is a member of the EAEU, and Russia remains a key partner. Therefore, according to him, the Armenian side is trying to show that there are also contacts with the Russian side, because the contacts with representatives of Brussels and Washington are frequent and intense.

“And in the case of Russia, there is a problem of maintaining contacts in the conditions of geopolitical turbulence. In addition, there are many current issues that will be discussed, both related to EAEU and railways. I think that a conversation will take place in this regard, it will be one of the key topics of this meeting, however, it is difficult to say what the outcome will be, because the Russian side has already expressed a negative position in this regard once. However, this time is a little different, because the issue will be discussed during the meeting. It should be clarified that, in my opinion, removing the Russian presence from that sphere is a geopolitical issue, not a complication for other countries from the point of view of cooperation with Armenia. And this completely fits into the framework of RA’s foreign policy in recent years,” said Simonov.

He found it difficult to say what would be the official reaction of Russia to such a request of Armenia. “I think it will become clear in a short time, or perhaps a certain general understanding was reached during the telephone conversation,” he said.

The analyst believes that this contact was not initiated by chance in this period, when Western events and high-ranking visits are expected in RA after some time.

“On the one hand, Yerevan is strengthening its relations with the West, on the other hand, in fact, it cannot ignore the existing deep relations with Moscow, especially in the economic and energy spheres. Taking all this into account, direct dialogue is maintained, but Yerevan’s political relations with the West are getting closer. Russia also has its own foreign policy objectives, Russian approaches have also changed a lot, so every issue is subject to discussion,” said Simonov.

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