May 4, 2026
Various foreign sources, figures on the days of the 44-day war in 2020 and beyond claimed that Azerbaijan used phosphorus ammunition in Artsakh, which was supplied to it by Ukraine. Of course, other sources also considered their supply by Israel likely.
President of Ukraine Zelensky in Yerevan today had a chance to deny the information circulating these years, when an Armenian journalist asked him why Kiev supplied phosphorus ammunition to Baku during the 44-day war, but he simply “ran away”. Maybe Zelensky had a reason for such behavior?
Now let’s turn to French President Macron, more specifically, the following he made during the 8th summit of the European Political Community (ECC). to the announcement.
“Let’s be honest՝ 8 years ago no one would have come here and the fact that we have so many first visits to your country is a really good indicator because 8 years ago this country was considered by many countries around the table as a de facto satellite of Russia.”
Does the first visit also refer to France, but it is worth reminding that 2006 թվականին Հայաստան է այցելել Ֆրանսիայի նախագահ Ժակ Շիրակը, and within the framework of the visit, the opening ceremony of the French square took place, He came to Armenia in 2011 President Nicolas Sarkozy, 2014 and François Hollande visited Armenia in 2015.
And since we were talking about visits, let’s add that in 2024 168.amthe wrote About Pashinyan’s French visits and those of Macron, moreover, at that time, in July 2021, in the booth of Azatutyun radio station, the French ambassador, in response to a journalist’s question about the specific dates of Macron’s visit, had said. “It will happen when it is most useful.”
Maybe after the depopulation of Artsakh and before the RA NA elections, this period is useful for Macron? By the way, let’s note that in 2025, French President Macron had announced that he conveyed to Nikol Pashinyan during a telephone conversation “France’s solidarity against attempts to destabilize Armenian democracy»:
We have written many times that France decided to supply arms to Armenia only after the depopulation of Artsakh.
168.am–also published: “Did the result of France-Azerbaijan military cooperation “appear” on the field of the 44-day war, or in what form was it observed?” with the text article: We have no intention of discrediting our friend France, we only present dry facts.
And since the Prime Minister of Canada is also in Yerevan, let us recall an episode revealed during the 44-day war in relation to them.
In particular, during the war, the Armed Forces of Artsakh managed to shoot down a Turkish-made Bayraktar TB2 ATS. Later, the Armed Forces of Artsakh published a video, and in one of the frames երևում էր կանադական արտադրության CMX 15D օպտիկա, of which there is on Turkish-made strike Bayraktar TB2 UAVs. After this, an embargo was imposed and Turkey was forced to develop the ASELFLIR-500 optical system.
And in order to participate in the 8th European Political Community (ECC) summit, Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis is also in Armenia, who was in Azerbaijan a few days ago, where he made serious military or defense agreements with Aliyev, i.e., the Czech Republic followed the example of Slovakia. intends to Not only to sell weapons to Baku, but also to open a joint venture.
The international political event in Yerevan did not ignore Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni, who, according to Azeri sources, will leave Armenia for Azerbaijan, which will follow the visit of Azeri Defense Minister Zakir Hasanov to Italy. Baku is also strengthening defense cooperation with Italy.
It should be noted that in 2024, Italy supplied Azerbaijan with C-27J Spartan military transport aircraft, which allows to provide tactical support to the army, special forces, etc. And Azerbaijani sources promise that there will be news related to Azerbaijan-Italy defense cooperation in the near future.
As for the Azerbaijan-Armenia peace agenda and relations, the summit of the European Political Community proved that there is no such thing as a mirror. For example, Aliyev ensured his participation in the meeting of European officials with a kind link, but Nikol Pashinyan is ready to visit Baku in 2028 to participate in the 12th summit of the European Political Community, which will be held there. Moreover, Nikol Pashinyan regularly accuses his opponents of making warlike and provocative statements, while during his speech, the dictator of Baku emphasized:
“In September 2023, Azerbaijan put an end to separatism in Karabakh. We turned into reality the 4 resolutions of the UN Security Council, which remained on paper for 30 years. The territorial integrity of Azerbaijan has the same value as the territorial integrity of any other country, and double standards in this matter are unacceptable.”
Aliyev then accused the European Parliament of harming and sabotaging the peace process.
“And the reason for this is that Azerbaijan has restored its territorial integrity and sovereignty, put an end to separatism and brought war criminals to justice.” he emphasized.
In other words, Aliyev considers the participants of the Karabakh movement, the participants of the Artsakh war, the former military-political leadership of Artsakh to be outright criminals and says that he conducted a “Nuremberg trial”, and Nikol Pashinyan does not respond in any way.
And this is despite the fact that when today’s government was an opposition, the third president of RA, Serzh Sargsyan, was accused of why he did not respond to the then president of Kazakhstan, Nursultan Nazarbayev, when he was reading the letter of the president of Azerbaijan, Ilham Aliyev, during the EAEU session.
On the other hand, Aliyev said today what Pashinyan is thinking and implying. And the President of Azerbaijan is right in one matter: Europe and European civilization should not resort to double standards, especially when it comes to the self-determination of nations and human rights.
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RFE/RL – European Summit Held In Yerevan (UPDATED)
- Karlen Aslanian
- Heghine Buniatian
The leaders of European Union member and partner states met in Yerevan on Monday for their latest European Political Community summit that underscored the Armenian government’s efforts to forge closer ties with the West.
The participants included French President Emmanuel Macron, British Prime Minister Keir Starmer, Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni and Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy. They were joined by the EU’s top officials as well as Canada’s Prime Minister Mark Carney and NATO Secretary General Mark Rutte.
German Chancellor Friedrich Merz skipped the summit, citing a busy schedule. Neighboring Turkey sent its Vice-President Cevdet Yilmaz to the gathering while Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev was due to address it via video link.
The semi-annual summit initiated by France following Russia’s 2022 invasion of Ukraine focused on “hybrid” threats and other political and economic challenges facing wider Europe. Addressing its participants, EU Council President Antonio Costa said the gathering “places Armenia in the heart of Europe, which is exactly where it belongs.” He also said the choice of the summit venue was made by possible by Armenian-Azerbaijani peace agreements reached last year.
“The fact that Armenia is hosting this summit is a powerful illustration of the country’s courageous geopolitical path, a path that Armenia and the EU are walking together,” Costa told a news conference later in the day.
Most of the participants will attend on Tuesday a separate summit between the EU and Armenia. According to a draft of its concluding statement seen by RFE/RL’s Armenian Service, the EU leaders will pledge to continue “bringing Armenia closer to the European Union” but stop short of promising the South Caucasus nation’s eventual membership in the 27-nation bloc. Nor does the document promise additional economic assistance to Yerevan.
The EU’s foreign and security policy chief, Kaja Kallas, would not be drawn on Armenia’s membership prospects. She indicated only that they depend on the outcome of the Armenian parliamentary elections slated for June 7.
“Armenia is making their own decisions and in Armenia we have elections coming in two months,” Kallas told journalists in Yerevan. “So European perspective is also on the table. But eventually the Armenians will decide.”
Amid heightened tensions with Russia, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s government enacted last year a law calling for the “start of a process of Armenia’s accession to the European Union.” Russian officials have since repeatedly warned that Armenia risks paying a heavy price for this policy. Moscow stepped up those warnings in the run-up to the Yerevan summits. Zelenskyy’s arrival in the Armenian capital could only add to the Russian-Armenian tensions.
The summits are seen by the Armenian opposition as a show of Western support for Pashinian ahead of the upcoming elections. In a weekend statement, the Hayastan alliance, one of the main opposition election contenders, accused the EU of effectively meddling in “Armenia’s internal political processes.”
“We regret to note that statements made by representatives of the European Union’s executive branch only increase our concerns that the manipulative actions of the Armenian authorities appear to be receiving European support,” it said in a statement.
“It is vital to strengthen Armenian democracy and fight external interference and misinformation,” Costa said in this regard.
Earlier this year, the EU decided to send two new missions to Armenia tasked with helping Yerevan cope with “hybrid threats” emanating from abroad, presumably Russia. A similar EU mission was deployed in Moldova ahead of last September’s parliamentary elections won by the former Soviet republic’s pro-Western leadership.
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Zelenskyy, Pashinian Meet In Yerevan
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and Ukraine’s President Volodymyr Zelenskyy called for closer ties between their countries on Monday when they met on the sidelines of a European Political Community summit in Yerevan.
“This is the first visit of a president of Ukraine to Armenia in 24 years. It is important that we are resuming an active dialogue between our countries,” Zelenskyy said in a social media post.
“We discussed the situation in the region and security challenges and threats,” he wrote after the “good” meeting with Pashinian.
In a separate statement, Zelenskyy’s office reported that he also welcomed Yerevan’s “steps towards rapprochement with the European Union” and said Kyiv is “ready to support Armenia’s pro-European initiatives.”
“It matters that Armenia stands here with all Europeans,” Zelensky said in his speech at the summit earlier in the day.
According to an Armenian readout of Pashinian’s talks with Zelenskyy, the two leaders emphasized “the importance of deepening cooperation in areas of mutual interest.” They also discussed “regional and global developments.”
The Armenian and Ukrainian foreign ministers met separately during the summit held just a few kilometers from the Erebuni airbase, home to Russian warplanes. They are part of a Russian military contingent in Armenia.
Zelenskyy’s trip to Yerevan could add to Armenia’s lingering tensions with Russia. President Vladimir Putin and other Russian officials have warned in recent weeks that the South Caucasus country would pay a heavy economic price for its government’s continued drift to the EU.
Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, said in 2024 that Yerevan should not follow Kyiv’s example in reorienting Armenian foreign policy towards the West. Another Russian official claimed earlier that Pashinian is “following in Zelenskyy’s footsteps” and helping the West “turn Armenia into another Ukraine.”
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19 Armenian Parties, Blocs Cleared To Run In June Elections
- Ruzanna Stepanian
Armenia’s Central Election Commission (CEC) has registered 17 political parties and two alliances, including the one led by billionaire Samvel Karapetian, for parliamentary elections in which Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian could face an uphill battle to stay in power.
Karapetian’s Strong Armenia bloc was cleared to run in the June 7 elections along with former President Robert Kocharian’s Hayastan alliance and the Prosperous Armenia Party (BHK) led by another wealthy businessman, Gagik Tsarukian. The three opposition groups are expected to be the ruling Civil Contract party’s main election challengers.
Among other opposition contenders are former human rights ombudsman Arman Tatoyan’s Wings of Unity party, former President Levon Ter-Petrosian’s Armenian National Congress and Edmon Marukian’s Bright Armenia Party. Also in the running are three pro-government and pro-Western parties that have failed to agree on a joint list of candidates.
The elections will be held solely under the system of proportional representation. The parties will need to win at least 4 percent of the vote in order to be represented in the new Armenian parliament. The legal threshold for blocs is set at 8 percent.
Pashinian declared on April 17 that Strong Armenia, Hayastan and the BHK must not win any parliament seats. The statement contrasted with what senior senior members of Pashinian’s party said in March and February this year.
In a series of social media posts, they signaled concerns that the three opposition forces could collectively win a majority in the next parliament and thus oust Pashinian. They said at the same time that the country’s leadership “will not allow” such an outcome, stoking media speculation that at least some of the opposition heavyweights could be barred from the June 7 elections.
Although they all were registered by the CEC on Sunday, Armenian law allows the election body headed by a Pashinian ally to ask courts to disqualify in the coming weeks contenders accused by it of systematic vote buying or campaign financing irregularities. In recent weeks, dozens of Strong Armenia members and supporters have been detained on charges of bribing voters strongly denied by Karapetian’s bloc.
Karapetian is facing separate charges brought against him following his controversial arrest in June 2025. The Russian-Armenian tycoon remains under house arrest and will therefore not be able to physically attend campaign rallies. But he is allowed to receive aides, loyalists and journalists and make public statements from his Yerevan mansion. In one such interview publicized on Sunday, Karapetian warned Pashinian’s government against trying to win the June 7 ballot through fraud or foul play.
“Rest assured that we will win,” he said. “They will not manage to do anything. They have been doing everything for 10 months, nothing has worked. But if they suddenly take such ridiculous steps, that will have serious consequences.”
A senior member of Kocharian’s bloc, Artur Khachatrian, likewise implicitly warned on Monday of post-election protests in Yerevan.
“When Pashinian sees that he cannot cling to power through fair elections, I am sure that he will try to seize power, to stage a coup d’état,” claimed Khachatrian. “But the voters, the people must be ready to stand by their votes.”
The opposition Republican Party led by another ex-president, Serzh Sarkisian, has expressed readiness to join such protests despite its decision not to participate in the elections due to an apparent lack of public support.
“If the current regime seizes power again through the abuse of administrative resources and unacceptable methods under unequal conditions, the Republican Party is ready to take its place at the forefront of a post-election struggle,” Sarkisian said last week.
Pashinian’s aides and political allies did not respond to the opposition warnings on Monday. The CEC chairman, Vahagn Hovakimian, insisted in December that he will do his best to ensure the proper conduct of the polls.
Pashinian and his party are already accused by the opposition of trying to buy votes with public money as well as through a private charity run by the premier’s wife, Anna Hakobian. No Civil Contract party member is known to have been prosecuted on corresponding charges.
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RFE/RL – Aliyev Slams ‘Pro-Armenian’ EU Parliament
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev condemned the European Parliament for asserting the rights of Nagorno-Karabakh’s displaced Armenian population as he addressed the European Political Community summit in Yerevan via video link on Monday.
“Since the second Karabakh war, from 2021 to 2026, the European Parliament has adopted 14 resolutions that lie about Azerbaijan in a very offensive way,” Aliyev said. “The latest one [was adopted] just four days before this summit.”
Aliyev said that Azerbaijan “put an end to separatism” in Karabakh in line with international law. He went on to announce that Azerbaijan’s parliament will sever all ties with the European Union’s legislative body in response to the “provocative” resolution overwhelmingly passed on April 30.
The resolution demanded the immediate release of Armenian prisoners held in Azerbaijan and reaffirmed support for the Karabakh Armenians’ right to return to their homeland, recaptured by Baku in 2023, safely and “under international guarantees.” In a clear reference to the destruction of Karabakh’s Armenian churches, it also said “those responsible for the destruction of Armenian cultural and religious heritage” must be held accountable.
Roberta Metsola, the European Parliament speaker attending the Yerevan summit in person, was quick to hit back at Aliyev. While its resolutions “may cause inconvenience to many,” the EU legislature “will never change our working methods and the positions we adopt,” Metsola said as several dozen Karabakh Armenian refugees demonstrated outside the summit venue.
In contrast to the European Parliament, the Armenian government has essentially stopped criticizing Baku since Aliyev and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian initialed a bilateral peace treaty in Washington last August. Pashinian has declined to even denounce the recent demolition of Karabakh’s largest Armenian church. He has repeatedly said that the refugees should forget about returning to Karabakh.
“We are now working closely with Azerbaijan to consolidate and institutionalize peace between our two countries,” Pashinian told the summit.
He said he hopes to attend a European Political Community summit in Azerbaijan which is due to take place in 2028.
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Turkish Press: Turkish vice president makes highest-level visit to Armenia sin
Turkish Vice President Cevdet Yılmaz met with Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in Yerevan on Monday, marking the highest-level visit by a Turkish official to Armenia since 2008, as the two countries continue cautious efforts to normalize relations.
Yılmaz is representing President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan at the eighth European Political Community (EPC) summit in the Armenian capital, where leaders are gathering under the theme “Building the Future: Unity and Stability in Europe.”
In a statement on X, Yılmaz said he had a “comprehensive and productive” meeting with Pashinyan on behalf of Erdoğan, discussing bilateral ties and cooperation on transportation, customs, energy, digital infrastructure and connectivity.
He also welcomed “concrete progress” in the process of normalization, pointing to a memorandum of understanding signed for the joint restoration of the Ani Bridge, a medieval bridge over the Arpaçay/Akhurian River near the ruins of Ani that once connected Anatolia and the South Caucasus and today stands as a symbolic link on the closed Turkey-Armenia border.
The memorandum was signed under the auspices of Yılmaz and Pashinyan by Serdar Kılıç, Turkey’s special representative for the normalization process, and Ruben Rubinyan, Armenia’s special envoy.
Yılmaz’s visit is the highest-level trip by a Turkish official to Yerevan since then-president Abdullah Gül traveled to Armenia in 2008 during a period of so-called “football diplomacy.”
Gül attended a Turkey-Armenia World Cup qualifying match with his Armenian counterpart, Serzh Sargsyan, in a visit that briefly raised hopes for reconciliation.
The latest diplomatic contact comes as Ankara and Yerevan have taken a series of steps to advance normalization, although their land border remains closed and Turkey continues to link further progress to a final peace agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan.
Meanwhile, the Turkish Foreign Ministry has denied reports that Turkey’s land border with Armenia will reopen on June 4, saying there is not yet a timetable for opening the border, T24 reported.
Ministry sources told T24 that the process between Ankara and Yerevan has continued uninterrupted for four years with the goal of “full normalization” and that confidence-building steps have been taken in areas ranging from transportation and trade to culture and education.
They said preparatory work at the border was intended to allow any future decision to be implemented quickly but stressed that no date had been set.
“With the signing of a peace agreement between Azerbaijan and Armenia, the process our country is conducting with Armenia will gain momentum. Therefore, there is currently no timetable for the opening of the border gates,” the sources said.
The statement came after Turkish media reports claimed on Monday that the Turkey-Armenia land border could be opened on June 4, just days before Armenia’s June 7 parliamentary elections and while Yerevan hosts the EPC summit.
Turkey and Armenia have no formal diplomatic relations. Their border, including the Alican-Margara crossing linking Turkey’s Iğdır province with Armenia’s Armavir region, has been closed since 1993, when Ankara shut it in support of Azerbaijan during the first Nagorno-Karabakh war.
The crossing briefly reopened in 2023 to allow Armenian aid into Turkey following two powerful earthquakes on Feb. 6 and later hosted a round of normalization talks between the two countries’ special envoys.
A renewed normalization process was launched after the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war, which ended with Azerbaijan regaining control of territory it had lost in the 1990s. Ankara and Yerevan appointed special envoys, who held their first meeting in Moscow in January 2022.
The fifth round of talks between the special representatives was held at the Alican crossing on July 30, 2024.
As part of the process, the sides agreed on several confidence-building measures, including the start of direct flights, air cargo transport and the opening of the land border to third-country nationals and diplomatic passport holders, although the border remains closed.
The normalization process has also included recent talks on reopening the Kars-Gyumri railway, the only rail link between Turkey and Armenia. Turkish and Armenian officials met in Kars in late April to form a joint working group and said the line should be put back into operation as soon as possible.
The railway, once an important trade and transit route, has been idle since 1993, when the last train crossed the border during tensions over Nagorno-Karabakh.
Recent momentum in Turkey-Armenia contacts has coincided with progress, but not a final agreement, between Armenia and Azerbaijan. The two countries initialed a peace deal at a summit in Washington in August 2025, but the agreement has not yet been formally signed.
Azerbaijan has demanded changes to Armenia’s constitution before signing the final agreement, claiming that it contains claims against Azerbaijani territory. Pashinyan has pledged constitutional changes, but a possible referendum is expected to come after the June 7 elections.
The EPC summit is being chaired by European Council President António Costa and Pashinyan.
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EU and Canada deepen ties at Armenia summit in face of Putin and Trump threats
EU and Canada deepen ties at Armenia summit in face of Putin and Trump threats
Canada, the EU, EU-aspirant, and other European states have pledged closer alignment in the face of Russian and US geopolitical threats.
“We know nostalgia is not a strategy, but we don’t think that we’re destined to submit to a more transactional, insular, and brutal world,” said Canadian prime minister Mark Carney at a European summit in Yerevan on Monday (4 May).
“It’s my strong personal view that as the international order will be rebuilt, it will be rebuilt out of Europe. And so I’m very appreciative of the symbolism of this invitation,” he added.
“We are the most European of non-European countries,” Carney said.
The Yerevan summit of the European Political Community (EPC) brought together mostly EU leaders, those from EU-aspirant countries in the eastern neighbourhood, such as Armenia, Moldova, and Ukraine, as well as Iceland, Norway, and Turkey.
It was held in the shadow not just of Russia’s war on Ukraine, but also of unilateral US aggression against Venezuela and Iran, as well as US president Donald Trump’s threats to end Nato.
And Carney came to Yerevan after Trump had also threatened Canada and Greenland in the run-up to the Davos World Economic Forum in Switzerland in January, where the Canadian leader inspired EU peers with a speech on the need for “middle powers” to stand together to tame unruly “hegemons”.
Carney pledged to keep Canadian troops in Nato’s Russia-deterrent multinational battalion in Latvia and to work with Europe on more secure supplies of energy, semiconductors, critical minerals, and vaccines, as well as on digital sovereignty and on US-independent payment systems.
For his part, French president Emmanuel Macron said in Yerevan: “The Russian war against Ukraine revealed our over-dependencies regarding gas and Russian gas. We are [now] experiencing the cost of our over-dependencies when we speak about the American umbrella in terms of defence and security”.
“Let’s be honest, this is the elephant in the room,” he said of Trump’s America.
“Ukraine is by far the hottest topic” on the EU agenda, Macron added, amid fears Trump might pull US troops from Europe, leaving Nato open to an attack by Russia after the Ukraine war calms down.
And the Ukrainian president, Volodomyr Zelensky, underlined that its drone-warfare capabilities could help protect the EU in a post-Nato theatre.
“They [the Russians] fear drones may buzz over Red Square. This is telling. It shows they are not strong now,” Zelensky said in Yerevan, alluding to Ukraine’s disruption of Russian president Vladimir Putin’s military parade on Saturday, designed to commemorate the end of World War 2, which Kyiv was actively trying to derail despite Trump’s demand for it to let Putin host his event in peace.
Armenia
Meanwhile, Armenia itself had been pulled into Russia’s orbit in 2014 when it joined Putin’s ‘Eurasian Economic Community’, but it broke with Moscow when Russian peacekeepers failed to stop Azerbaijan from conquering an Armenian-held region in 2023.
“Eight years ago, this country was seen by a lot of countries around the [EPC] table as a sort of de facto satellite of Russia,” said Macron on Monday.
“[Armenian prime minister] Nikol [Pashinayn] organised this velvet revolution and decided to de-risk his country from Russia. And he still gets attacked on a daily basis because of that,” Macron added, referring to the 2018 pro-democratic Armenian Revolution.
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Türkiye and Armenia Pledge to Restore Historic Border Bridge
Türkiye and Armenia on Monday signed an agreement to jointly restore the medieval Ani bridge on their shared border, as part of moves to normalize ties between the two countries.
“We believe that symbolic and concrete areas of cooperation, such as the joint restoration of the Ani bridge which was formalized today by a memorandum of understanding, will help establish a lasting climate of peace and security,” said Türkiye’s Vice President Cevdet Yilmaz.
Yilmaz met Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on the sidelines of the eighth European Political Community summit in Yerevan.
Pashinyan wrote on X that he had a “fruitful exchange” with Yilmaz and hailed the bridge restoration deal.
The bridge was built in the 10th century over the Arpacay river, which borders the medieval site of Ani in eastern Türkiye, the capital of the former Armenian kingdom.
It had two levels, one for caravans underneath and another above for pedestrians.
Only its piers are still standing and visible.
Restoration of the site, which was entered on the UNESCO World Heritage List in 2016, is already the subject of scientific cooperation between the two countries.
Yerevan and Ankara have not established diplomatic relations and their land border, which was briefly opened in the early 1990s, remains shut.
The two countries have pursued a cautious rapprochement since the end of 2021 and Azerbaijan’s seizure of Karabakh, which saw most of the Armenian population leave.
At the end of last month, they decided to put the Kars-Gyumri railway line back into service on both sides of the border.
Türkiye’s national carrier, Turkish Airlines, operated its first direct flight between Istanbul and Yerevan in March.
But the two sides remain divided.
The Armenians say 1.5 million of their people were killed under the Ottoman Empire from 1915 to 1917 and seek international recognition that it was genocide.
Türkiye strongly denies the accusation of genocide and disputes the numbers, saying that the Armenians were among hundreds of thousands of people who died in the turmoil of World War I as the Ottoman Empire disintegrated.
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Armenia has chosen path ‘towards Europe’, Macron says AFP
Armenia has chosen the path “towards Europe”, French President Emmanuel Macron said during a visit to Yerevan on Monday, as the landlocked post-Soviet state cautiously shifts away from Russia’s political orbit.
Armenia has been building ties with Europe for years, amid frustration in the country over Moscow’s perceived failure to protect it during conflicts with neighbouring Azerbaijan.
“For decades, we had become somewhat accustomed to Armenia being, in a way, a satellite of Russia,” Macron told members of Armenia’s French community in the capital Yerevan.
“Armenia has indeed made the choice… to break free from this constraint and turn towards Europe,” he added.
Macron also said France had provided material support for Armenia during conflicts with Azerbaijan.
“Russia was not there, any more than it is there for Venezuela when there are problems,” he said.
France is home to one of the largest Armenian diaspora communities in the world.
The two countries have a history of close diplomatic relations.
Dozens of European leaders including Macron were in Yerevan this week for a summit of the European Political Community, as well as a joint Armenian-EU summit.
vl-cad/ach
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Summit in Yerevan: Armenia is moving closer to the EU, with a focus on securit
Author:
Branko Lozančić
The leaders of the European Political Community members gathered in Yerevan, the capital of Armenia. The main topics of discussion are the region’s democratic resilience and energy security. Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenković is participating in the meeting, and the summit in Armenia also has a certain symbolism because the country is facing elections in which it wants to move closer to the West, while simultaneously facing pressure from Russia.
“The summit of the European Political Community in Yerevan has strong political symbolism ahead of the parliamentary elections in Armenia, in which the EU expects pro-European Prime Minister Nikola Pashinyan to win. It is an attempt to distance the country from Russian influence, although Armenia still remains strongly economically tied to Russia, especially through gas imports,” journalist Tamara Marković said in a direct report for Croatian Television news.
At the same time, Armenia maintains good relations with Iran, with which it conducted joint military exercises last year, while the EU is announcing 12 million euros in aid to combat hybrid threats.
The summit was also dominated by topics related to NATO, following the announcement of the US withdrawal of some troops from Germany.
Secretary General Mark Rutte said that European countries are strengthening the implementation of agreements on the use of military bases, while Prime Minister Andrej Plenković assessed that the Alliance is stable.
Croatia and Armenia strengthen cooperation, strategic dialogue signed
The fact that the small Caucasian state has been chosen to host the European Political Community is a clear political message.
Armenia is gradually moving away from the Russian orbit and turning to the West. Although Russia still has a military base on its territory, Yerevan has frozen participation in the military alliance led by Moscow.
On the sidelines of the summit, Prime Ministers Andrej Plenković and Nikol Pashinyan signed a Joint Declaration on the Strategic Dialogue between Croatia and Armenia, with the aim of deepening cooperation – including defense and security.
“They would like, at least the Prime Minister’s political position is, to be as close as possible to the European Union, to reach European standards. In this context, Croatia plays an important role in the transfer of knowledge. We have a twinning project with Slovenia where we are helping in their healthcare reform segment,” said Prime Minister Andrej Plenković.
The European Political Community brings together countries from across the continent – intentionally excluding Russia and Belarus. The initiative was launched in 2022 by French President Emmanuel Macron to open up a new space for political and security cooperation in Europe.
“We Europeans are building our own security solutions. We have been doing this since 2022 by establishing the European Political Community, but also by creating a coalition of those willing to provide security guarantees to Ukraine,” said French President Emmanuel Macron.
EU and Armenia strengthen partnership, focus on defense
Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky is also attending the summit for the first time this year. In the Caucasus, where Russian influence has significantly weakened, the focus of European leaders is on defense.
“We need to strengthen our military capabilities so that we can defend and protect ourselves. We have huge financial resources at our disposal for investment. Now we really need to accelerate and intensify the process of producing military capabilities. And the third element is the issue of reliable supply chains,” said European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen.
Tomorrow, the first bilateral summit between the European Union and Armenia will be held in Yerevan, where the formalization of a new strategic partnership is expected.
Although it remains a member of the Russian-led Eurasian Economic Union, Armenia is increasingly openly stating that it will remain within that framework only as long as it is compatible with rapprochement with the European Union.
Source: HRT
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