On June 23, this year, when the Eurasian Economic Union’s (EEU) Board session was held in Sochi and Russia’s First Deputy Prime Minister, Igor Shuvalov, announced that in case of accession to the EEU, Armenia should compensate the World Trade Organization (WTO) member countries the difference of customs duties defined by the EEU and WTO, a number of economists and political scientist were predicting Armenia’s membership failure to EEU and the Customs Union. Recently, Russian Prime Minister, Dmitry Medvedev, has signed a Government decree on giving approval to the draft of the agreement of Armenia’s accession to the Eurasian Economic Union, and has instructed to present the proposal of signing the aforementioned agreement to the President of Russia. President of Belarus, Alexander Lukashenko, in his telephone conversation with Putin had that Armenia’s accession to the EEU should not be to the detriment of the Customs Union.
Whether there are attempts made to the failure of Armenian’s accession to the EEU and the Customs Union, and Armenia is persistently making steps towards these structures, political scientist Stepan Danielyan thinks that it is not important as to what they say, but why they say. “As far as I understand, Russia wants to involve Armenian into the Customs Union in order to balance the votes of Kazakhstan and Belarus: to have 2 votes instead of one, Armenia is the same vote as Russia. Naturally, Belarus and Kazakhstan would be reluctant for Russia to have this kind of influence during the decision-making process”, such opinion was expressed by Mr. Danielyan, in the conversation with Aravot.am. These statements, according to the political scientist, should not be treated seriously. “Because we see what processes are going on in both the territory of the former Soviet Union and the Western Europe. The Ukraine crisis does not only put the future of the Customs Union in question, in general, but also causes serious problems inside the Eurasian Union. Different countries have different interests, and to speak in such conditions that something has already been decided, is inappropriate. In other words, processes take place, which are not definite, such statements, in many cases, have a tactical and psychological significance. Nothing at this moment is decided.”
Nelly BABAYAN
