RF President’s Advisor Sergey Glazyev about his scandalous comparison
Beginning of the previous edition
– In the four years of Armenia’s negotiations with the EU, everything seemed normal, the negotiating parties were satisfied, and all of a sudden, on September 3, unexpectedly for everyone, the statement of the President of Armenia in Moscow is voiced. Don’t you agree that everything was very sudden and suspicious?
– It was unexpected, because people have not read the text of the EU-Armenia Association Agreement. The same for Ukraine: the text was in secret, no one had seen it. They did not show the text to anyone, neither to the Armenian people, neither to the business sector, nor to us. And in the website of the Eurasian Common Economic Area, the entire database of legal agreements of the Customs Union is accessible to all, and everything is very simple: to become a member of the Customs Union, Armenia should only join these agreements, which would be followed by activities of forming respective road map and relevant schedule.
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– You famous comparison with Kaliningrad region, was not perceived in Armenia, if not to say that it caused quite a big anti-reaction. Why did you bring just this example? Do you see a tendency in Armenia?
– Here, there is no problem of sovereignty. The example of Kaliningrad region carries absolutely a conventional character, with respect to the absence of common border. If Armenia enters into the Customs Union, it turns out to be a common customs area, where Armenia becomes an island without having a common border.
Kaliningrad region has another status, it is a part of RF, but with the RF, it becomes a part of unified customs territory. It is the part of common Customs Union that has no common border, like Armenia. But, this comparison, surely, does not set a goal of the international manifestations. Armenia is a sovereign state, Kaliningrad region is a part of RF, and the comparison, here, has purely technical, in the sense that it is possible to have a common customs border without having common geographical borders. This technical comparison, surely, does not set a goal of comparison between a sovereign state and a region.
– Armenia’s Prime Minister, as we know, was against Armenia’s joining the Customs Union, and the Eurasian Union, and in all his speeches during the past year, he was bringing forward the issue of the lack of, at least, common border, which, according to him, makes such cooperation ineffective. After the President Sargsyan’s statement in Moscow, as we know, the Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan submitted his resignation. How are you going to work with an official, who was principally against Armenia’s membership to this structure?
– I have a great respect for the Prime Minister of Armenia, but I would recommend him to read the agreement carefully, that he wanted to sign with the EU. In the Armenia-EU Association Agreement, as I have already said, it is written that Armenia will not only implement the EU directives in technical, sanitary, animal husbandry, and trade regulation sectors, but it is also written that Armenia should meet the EU standards for fisheries and marine areas, and so on. In other words, the Armenian negotiators did not even bother themselves to read the texts, in which similar tails from similar agreements are left from the document signed between the EU and Arab countries, with which the EU has a common lagoon in the Mediterranean Sea.
And, why I am saying this, because the draft of the EU Association Agreement was not properly analyze in Armenia.
– And what outcome is expected on the issue of NKR? Today, the question of where the Customs checkpoints should be placed in Armenia is much discussed about.
– I think the situation will be like now. Now are there Customs checkpoints, or not? If, now, there are no Customs checkpoints at the Armenia-Karabakh border, they will not be. It is Armenia’s internal issue. The problem that exists between Armenia and Azerbaijan with regard to the Azeri requirements, the Customs Union does not extend to geopolitical matters. As I said before, since there is no common border with Armenia, it’s all the same, within the boundaries of the Customs Union, we do not have to conduct monitoring of goods imported from Armenia to RF, while Armenia needs to conduct monitoring of products imported from RF, Belarus and Kazakhstan, just to follow that these products conform to the production standards. But, what is inside, it is Armenia’s absolute right, we do not include the Customs checkpoints in the competence of the Customs Union. The National Customs checkpoints functioning inside remain and operate within the framework of national laws regulating the Customs checkpoint activities. Public service is maintained, therefore, the customs officers of Armenia and border guards as they are standing so they will stay. The regime that is available with Karabakh, is not in any way connected with Armenia’s joining the Customs Union.
– You assert that there have been no pressures from the RF on Armenia’s joining the Customs Union, but they were more than obvious in the case of Ukraine.
– I would not say so, it is just presented that way that the pressures are exerted by the RF. We just warn our Ukrainian colleagues as to what outcomes would arise at signing the EU Association Agreement. We do not intimidate them, we are not setting conditions, we are just saying that if you give sovereignty to Brussels, you can not be a partner with us with its consequences, we will stop trusting you in the sector of production of goods, because you are subordinated to Brussels, you will be compelled to conduct a tougher vet epidemic control because you will import European agricultural products without control, and so on and so forth.
It is incompatible with the enormous pressure that the U.S. and the EU employ against Ukraine. U.S. Ambassador does not stop intimidating Ukraine that it should join the EU, Yanukovich has to accept European commissioners every week. European officials do not come out of Ukraine in general, they are always there. The European ambassadors are very actively “processing” the Ukrainian politicians. In other words, the terror is coming more from them.
Interviewer Nelly GRIGORYAN
