On 4-day April war, Deputy Prime Minister of Russia, Dmitry Rogozin, stated that Russia will continue to sell weapons to its strategic partner countries Armenia and Azerbaijan. In addition to the statement of selling weapons in war situation, there is one more remarkable news in the Russian deputy prime minister’s observations, and it is the point that Azerbaijan is Russia’s strategic partner. No such a statement, however, was voiced by Russian functionaries. In this context, to the question of Aravor.am of how you would call Russian-Azerbaijani relations whether Azerbaijan is as much strategic partner for Russia as Armenia, the Head of the RF MFA CIS department, Alexei Pavlovsky, said that they rely on the interstate documents which give the description of the relations. “The relations with Armenia … Are you say that they are such …? they are not. The relationship with Armenia is partnering. The relations with Azerbaijan are not partnering, we describe them as a strategic partnership. Both words are understandable: partnership means mutual partnering, a strategic partnership means that the mutual partnering is long-lasting on objective grounds. The objective grounds of Russian-Azerbaijani partnership are clear: geographical location, economic ties, and the existence of huge Azerbaijani diaspora in Russia. It is all that we call a strategic partnership. Well, of course, Azerbaijan is not Russia’s partner like Armenia. We are in military-political alliance with Armenia, we have numerous agreements, including partnership. Here’s the difference. And to say that these relationships are perceived in Russia equally, it is not right.” The Russian official noted that not everyone considers the details and therefore, Rogozin’s statement was accepted critically, “How can such a thing be?” He agrees that the society does not read the interstate documents but he notes that the nuances are there, behind which there is a certain political content. These days, several Armenians journalists are in the Russia capital Moscow under the “New Vision” project in cooperation with the mass media.
Responding to the observation by one of the journalists that in any case the statements by the officials are not clearly perceived by the society, and accordingly, they affect the public opinion, Alexei Pavlovsky noted that the role of the political scientists and journalists becomes significant right in such cases as they notice the nuances and must give a cue to the public.
Nelly GRIGORYAN
