Armenia is free to end its membership in the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), the Russian Foreign Ministry said on Friday in response to exit threats made by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
“We still do not question the sovereign right of our Armenian partners to independently determine their foreign policy course, including in the context of the further work of the organization,” the ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova told a news briefing in Moscow.
“Let me remind you that Article 19 of the [CSTO} Charter establishes the possibility of leaving the alliance,” Zakharova said. “In that case, a member state … must send an official notification no later than six months before the withdrawal date.”
The Armenian government, she said, has taken no steps in that direction so far despite its “constantly circulated accusations against the organization.” This means that Armenia remains for now a full-fledged member of the Russian-led military alliance and must “must fulfill appropriate obligations,” added Zakharova. She did not specify those obligations.
Read also
Over the past year or so, Yerevan has boycotted high-level meetings, military exercises and other activities of the CSTO in what Pashinyan described in February as an effective suspension of Armenia’s CSTO membership. The premier repeatedly said afterwards that he could pull his country out of the alliance of six ex-Soviet states altogether.
“Our public is wondering why we continue to be a member of the Collective Security Treaty Organization. To be honest, I don’t have an answer to that question,” Pashinyan said late last month.
Armenia officially asked Russia and other CSTO member states for support after Azerbaijan’s offensive military operations launched along the Armenian-Azerbaijani border in September 2022. It has repeatedly accused them of ignoring the request. Moscow denies that.
The threats to leave the CSTO are part of Yerevan’s broader rift with Moscow which is continuing to deepen. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov charged in March that Pashinyan’s administration is “leading things to the collapse of Russian-Armenian relations” at the behest of the West.