Five years after Armenia’s pro-European colour revolution, disappointment with Russia as an economic and security partner is higher than ever. Nonetheless, European Union accession remains unlikely anytime soon. 

Armenia may officially remain in the Kremlin-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO), despite prime minister Nikol Pashinyan’s threat this May to withdraw from the alliance, but its leaders and public are anything but quiet about their dissatisfaction with the allies that have repeatedly let them down. 

“Armenia’s security architecture was 99.999 per cent linked to Russia, including when it came to the procurement of arms and ammunition,” Pashinyan (pictured above with French President Emmanuel Macron) said in an interview published on September 3.

“But today we see that Russia itself is in need of weapons, arms and ammunition (for the war in Ukraine) and in this situation it’s understandable that even if it wishes so, the Russian Federation cannot meet Armenia’s security needs.” 

“This example should demonstrate to us that dependence on just one partner in security matters is a strategic mistake,” he added. 

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Many Armenians feel betrayed that Moscow and the CSTO failed to provide more support during the 2020 Karabakh War with Azerbaijan and declined to come to Armenia’s defence after an Azerbaijani incursion into the territory of Armenia-proper in September 2022 left almost 300 dead. Between 2011 and 2020, Russia was the largest supplier of arms to both Armenia and Azerbaijan. 

A poll taken by the International Republican Institute (IRI) this spring found that more Armenians viewed France and Iran as important security partners than Russia. France, Iran and the United States—all home to large Armenian diasporas—were viewed as the top three “most important political partners for Armenia” by 75, 67 and 52 per cent of respondents respectively, while Russia was fourth on the list with 50 per cent.  

While the IRI’s 2019 survey found 93 per cent of Armenians considered relations with Russia to be “good”, with only six per cent of respondents viewing them as “bad,” only 50 per cent still considered relations “good” this spring and 49 per cent viewed them as “bad.” 

The EU Neighbours East project’s annual public opinion survey in 2022 found that more Armenians trust the European Union than any other international organisation—55 per cent compared to only 45 per cent for the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU) and 35 per cent for the CSTO. 

Armenia has been gradually deepening ties with the West since its pro-European 2018 colour revolution, and the last year has seen a rapid acceleration in the deterioration of its security ties with Russia—despite still hosting Russian troops and theoretically depending on Russian peacekeepers to enforce the ceasefire that ended the 2020 war. 

Since last September’s escalation with Azerbaijan, Armenia has taken a host of concrete actions to distance itself from the CSTO.  

At a November CSTO summit in Yerevan, Pashinyan refused to sign a declaration and a document on joint measures to provide assistance to Armenia. He justified his decision by citing the lack of a “clear political assessment” by the alliance of Azerbaijan’s offensive two months prior.  

In March, when Yerevan would normally have chosen the CSTO’s new deputy secretary general, it renounced its right to take part in the bloc’s leadership rotation.  

That same month, the International Criminal Court (ICC) issued an arrest warrant for Russian president Vladimir Putin for his alleged role in war crimes in Ukraine, and one week later, Armenia’s constitutional court cleared the ratification of the ICC treaty. If approved, it would compel Armenian authorities to arrest Putin, should he ever visit.  

Even though accepting ICC jurisdiction would be as much about gaining new legal tools to hold Azerbaijan accountable as thumbing it to Putin, Moscow has reacted with stern warnings of “extremely negative” consequences for Yerevan.  

Nonetheless, Pashinyan’s government formally requested the ratification of the ICC treaty by parliament on September 1. In a symbolic move, the Armenian envoy to the CSTO was recalled on September 5 and reassigned to the Netherlands, where the ICC is headquartered.  

Most shocking of all, despite refusing to host a CSTO military exercise on its territory this January, Armenia announced on September 6 that it will hold a joint exercise with American troops from September 10 to 11 called “Eagle Partner 2023”.  

The snub came a day after Armenia decided it would provide humanitarian assistance to Ukraine for the first time since Russia’s invasion in February 2022. Pashinyan’s wife, Anna Hakobian, will personally deliver the aid to Kyiv.  

Armenia scores on democracy indices are comparable to several EU candidates. In Freedom House’s Nations in Transit 2023 report, Armenia scored 35 out of 100, just below EU candidates Moldova at 37 and Ukraine at 39 and above prospective candidate Georgia at 34. Armenia was the only country assessed in the report with improvements on more than one democracy indicator.  

However, Armenia is yet to apply for EU membership and would face unique challenges in its accession process. Armenia— along with Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine—was set to sign an Association Agreement that included a free trade agreement with the EU at the 2013 Eastern Partnership summit, but then-prime minister Serzh Sargsyan abruptly backed out in favour of joining the EEU, likely under pressure from Russia. The EEU’s own terms are incompatible with a free-trade agreement with the EU. 

However, in 2017, Armenia and the EU agreed to a Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement covering issues from human rights and rule of law to mining and tourism. In 2021, Armenia finalised an agreement to join the European Common Aviation Area. 

But before it would be able to pursue full EU membership, Armenia will almost certainly have to withdraw from both the CSTO and EEU. That could potentially expose Armenia to a decades-long period of economic and security limbo as it pursues the lengthy and arduous process of joining the EU with access to neither the EEU nor EU’s single markets and is on the receiving end of Moscow’s ire without other meaningful security guarantees.  

If, as Pashinyan says, it is a “strategic mistake” to choose “just one partner in security matters”, trying to simultaneously balance the support of France, the United States, Iran, India, and—to some extent—Russia also has its risks.

https://emerging-europe.com/news/let-down-by-moscow-armenia-looks-to-the-west/ 

Geopolitical crises are sometimes very complicated indeed. The 19th-century British Prime Minister, Viscount Palmerston, wryly acknowledged this when asked about the cause of a labyrinthine dispute that almost triggered a major war in the 1860s. 

“Only three men in Europe have ever understood it. One was Prince Albert, who is dead. The second was a German professor who became mad. I am the third and I have forgotten,” he said. 

The South Caucasus can feel a little like this at times, with overlapping claims and trans-generational arguments about land and ownership. 

While the dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh has sometimes seemed like this to outsiders, it has recently become much starker; both more alarming and more dangerous. 

The enclave’s substantial Armenian minority of around 120,000 is now besieged by the Azeri forces that won back control in 2020. They have effectively cut off food and medical supplies. Pregnant women now lose their babies because they lack help, while others faint while waiting in food queues. Temperatures are rising, armies are on the move, intense gunfire is exchanged and a new war is threatened. 

There are two major root causes. The first is Russian ambiguity, caused in part by the Kremlin’s focus on its unsuccessful war against Ukraine, and in part by its own uncertainty as to which of the two countries it supports. The second, linked, phenomenon is Azeri military superiority, which has given the Baku government of President Ilham Aliyev a sense that there will be no better time to move against its long-time Armenian rival and grab what it likes. 

The mood in both capitals, as well as Nagorno-Karabakh, is now somber. Little has been achieved on the diplomatic front. Several attempts to hold direct discussions between Azerbaijan and the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenian community have failed. 

Geopolitical crises are sometimes very complicated indeed. The 19th-century British Prime Minister, Viscount Palmerston, wryly acknowledged this when asked about the cause of a labyrinthine dispute that almost triggered a major war in the 1860s. 

“Only three men in Europe have ever understood it. One was Prince Albert, who is dead. The second was a German professor who became mad. I am the third and I have forgotten,” he said. 

The South Caucasus can feel a little like this at times, with overlapping claims and trans-generational arguments about land and ownership. 

While the dispute between Armenia and Azerbaijan over the enclave of Nagorno-Karabakh has sometimes seemed like this to outsiders, it has recently become much starker; both more alarming and more dangerous. 

The enclave’s substantial Armenian minority of around 120,000 is now besieged by the Azeri forces that won back control in 2020. They have effectively cut off food and medical supplies. Pregnant women now lose their babies because they lack help, while others faint while waiting in food queues. Temperatures are rising, armies are on the move, intense gunfire is exchanged and a new war is threatened. 

There are two major root causes. The first is Russian ambiguity, caused in part by the Kremlin’s focus on its unsuccessful war against Ukraine, and in part by its own uncertainty as to which of the two countries it supports. The second, linked, phenomenon is Azeri military superiority, which has given the Baku government of President Ilham Aliyev a sense that there will be no better time to move against its long-time Armenian rival and grab what it likes. 

The mood in both capitals, as well as Nagorno-Karabakh, is now somber. Little has been achieved on the diplomatic front. Several attempts to hold direct discussions between Azerbaijan and the Nagorno-Karabakh Armenian community have failed. 

The Azeris deny there is a siege at all, and say they will supply the items needed by the Armenian population. Armenians see this as a precursor to ethnic cleansing.  

A parallel negotiation has been underway. An initiative led by the European Union (EU) and supported by the US, seeks convincing mechanisms to ensure the rights of Karabakh Armenians. Moscow-led efforts meanwhile, have essentially pushed for a statement of rights enshrined in Azeri law. 

The true aims of the participants are less obvious, particularly Russia’s. Since its all-out war in Ukraine began, the Kremlin’s behavior in the South Caucasus has been puzzling. Although Moscow is doing very little diplomatically, it appears to hope that no one else does very much either. And while it wants to keep a leading position as the key mediator between Armenia and Azerbaijan, a position it traditionally enjoyed, it has become increasingly partial toward the Azeris.  

Moscow has made little mention of the plight of the Karabakh Armenians, beyond statements indicating that it is essentially Armenia’s own fault. It also accuses Yerevan of altering the conditions under which Russian peacekeepers were sent to the troubled area in November 2020. Weeks before that decision, as fighting raged and 5,000 troops on both sides died, the Kremlin had refused Armenia’s appeals for help under the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and their mutual Friendship Treaty. 

Armenia was angry then, and has become even more so since. In a series of political moves and statements, it has questioned the point of its relationship with Russia. Thus on September 4, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan used an interview with the Italian daily La Repubblica, to criticize Russia and state that relying on the Kremlin’s security pledges was “a strategic mistake.”  

With relations at a historic low, the ties that bind the two old allies are fraying. The Armenians have threatened to leave CSTO, and have recalled the country’s permanent representative to the organization. Armenia refused to join CSTO exercises in Belarus this month and instead announced its troops would drill with the US military. And just in case the Kremlin was failing to get the message, it sent the premier’s wife to personally deliver humanitarian aid to Ukraine, its first such shipment. 

Russia appears to seek a closer relationship with oil-rich Azerbaijan. The EU has growing influence and interests in the country given its expanding energy links with Azerbaijan, something that worries the Kremlin. Azerbaijan is also a key player in Russia’s ambitions to develop the International North-South Transport Corridor (INSTC) down to Iran to develop ties with that regime and improve routes for sanctions-busting. 

This all plays well with the regime of President Aliyev, who runs a profoundly repressive domestic regime, and now sees opportunities aplenty on his borders.  

He will need to be careful. Russia may switch policy if it can ever untangle itself from Ukraine, and an angry and resentful Armenia may simply bide its time before seeking to reverse the results of the 2020 war. 

Meanwhile, the clock is ticking and Armenians are going hungry. Too often there is a temptation to resolve intricate geopolitical issues with the imagined simplicities of war.  

Francis Harris is the Managing Editor at the Center for European Policy Analysis (CEPA.)

Europe’s Edge is CEPA’s online journal covering critical topics on the foreign policy docket across Europe and North America. All opinions are those of the author and do not necessarily represent the position or views of the institutions they represent or the Center for European Policy Analysis.