News - Lavrov: EU mission in Armenia is turning into a NATO mission

The situation in relations between Armenia and Russia does not inspire optimism due to the position of the Armenian leadership, which deliberately ruins relations with the Russian Federation. Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated in an interview with Izvestia on 28 March. "I have already had to comment on the current situation in Armenia, it certainly does not inspire optimism. The Armenian leadership, to put it bluntly, under far-fetched pretexts, twisting the history of the last three to three and a half years, is deliberately pursuing a course of collapsing relations with the Russian Federation," he said. According to Lavrov, this course of Yerevan is manifested in the slandering of Russian servicemen serving at the 102nd military base in Gyumri, border guards, as well as the Collective Security Treaty Organisation (CSTO) as a whole. Yerevan does not mention that it is the CSTO that has repeatedly defended Armenia's interests in difficult situations and, in 2021, was ready to send its peacekeeping mission to the country to reduce the tension in its relationships with Azerbaijan, the Russian Foreign Minister said. He recalled that the mandate of this mission was fully agreed upon at a ministerial meeting in Yerevan in the autumn of 2021, after which Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan declared the lack of consensus and summoned a similar EU mission to the country. It was subsequently doubled, and now troops from Norway, Canada, and the United States are being sent there, turning the EU mission into a NATO mission, Lavrov added. "This whole story of the past few years is being twisted by both Mr Pashinyan and his staff, the leadership of the Armenian parliament," he said.