“We can say that Armenian side did not lose in Sochi. More importantly, Azerbaijan did not gain anything. Two things were obvious that border adventure from Azerbaijani side failed. Secondly, Azerbaijan, in my opinion, has refused the proposal to enter into the EEU. This induced Russia to think that, however, a bird in the hand is worth two in the bush”, such a statement was made by the former Prime Minister of Armenia, also NA MP, Hrant Bagratyan, in the conversation with Aravot.am, estimating the outcomes of tripartite meeting between Putin-Aliyev-Serzh Sargsyan in Sochi.
To our question of how you assess the CSTO silence with regard to the border incidents, and failure to conduct investigation by the international organizations during the border incidents, so whether it is a result of unskillful policy by the Armenian side, or it does not depend on us, Mr. Bagratyan responded, “I do not think that much depends on us.” After the Sochi meeting, President of Armenia, Serzh Sargsyan, in his interview to “ArmNews”, referring to the sanctions against Russia, said that Armenia might have its benefits form it. He said, “On one hand, we say that sanctions are imposed against Russia, and this can hurt Russia’s economy, but we forget to say that Russia has also imposed sanctions against other countries. This means that great opportunities are opened in the Russian market for our agricultural producers. Please, let’s compensate. We will encourage people to produce more food.”
We asked Mr. Bagratyan whether he agrees with Serzh Sargsyan’s these remarks, whether we will benefit from these sanctions, or it will do harm to us. He replied, “In general, sanctions are unable to boost the development of economy. Yes, they open up little chances. But this is the one side of the medal. The other side of the medal are the losses: reduction of volume of exports to Russia, decline of transfers (already seen), reduction of volume of loans and so on. The problem is also that the losses appear at once. Meanwhile, partial compensation received in the result of the growth of export (I repeat, partial compensation) will take time. And generally, the losses for Armenia’s economy would be more than the benefits.”
Hripsime JEBEJYAN
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Photo by Gagik Shamshyan / shamsyan.com
