Your Excellency Minister Baiba Braže,
Dear Colleagues,
It is a particular pleasure to be in Riga today, in my new capacity as Minister of Foreign Affairs and International Trade of the Republic of Armenia.
Dear colleagues,
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I would like to emphasize that Minister Braže and I maintain regular contacts on a wide range of topics of mutual interest. Today as well, we had substantive discussions on key issues of our bilateral agenda, Armenia-EU relations, as well as regional and international developments.
During the recent years, Armenia and Latvia have succeeded in building a strong and dynamic political dialogue and a partnership grounded on friendship and shared democratic values. Armenia and Latvia are partners, united by the commitment to sovereignty, democracy and peace.
A key focus of our today’s discussions was the expansion of economic cooperation and the diversification of Armenia’s export markets. We agreed on the importance of translating our strong political dialogue into concrete economic outcomes by further promoting bilateral trade, encouraging investment and establishing closer links between our business communities.
In this context, I expressed my particular gratitude to Minister Braže for her prompt response and assistance in facilitating the urgent export of Armenian certain goods to the Latvian market. This practical support is highly valued and demonstrates Latvia’s readiness to contribute to Armenia’s economic diversification at a critical moment.
We also highlighted the importance of reciprocal visits by business delegations, the organization of joint business forums, direct engagement between our private sectors, and closer cooperation between the investment promotion agencies of our two countries. Armenia stands ready to explore concrete investment opportunities and develop targeted, mutually beneficial economic projects with Latvia.
We agreed on the need to develop more targeted and results-oriented cooperation in such areas as energy, resilience against hybrid threats, digital transformation, advanced technologies and artificial intelligence, e-governance, cybersecurity and education.
Dear colleagues,
Armenia’s deepening partnership with the European Union naturally occupied an important place in our discussions. We highly value Latvia’s consistent support for initiatives of particular importance to Armenia. Our cooperation in this area is multifaceted and includes the implementation of existing agreements, initiatives aimed at strengthening Armenia’s resilience and promoting economic diversification, as well as the identification of new avenues for partnership.
Visa liberalization with the European Union is a key priority for Armenia and an important component of our broader and deepening partnership with the EU. We highly value Latvia’s continued support for the Armenia–EU Visa Liberalization Dialogue and count on its constructive engagement as Armenia advances through the next stages of this process. We hope that, with Latvia’s continued support, Armenia will be able to advance its ambitious reform agenda, which is a cornerstone of our efforts in bringing the country closer to the European Union.
We also discussed our constructive cooperation within multilateral formats, including the continued development of cooperation within the Armenia–Nordic-Baltic Eight framework.
Dear Colleagues,
Today we also exchanged views on regional developments, the broader geopolitical situation and current challenges.
I presented Armenia’s efforts to further strengthen and institutionalize the peace already established between Armenia and Azerbaijan. We also discussed the importance of unblocking regional economic and transport infrastructures, which is a direct outcome of the peace and stability that have been established in our region. A clear example of this is the TRIPP project which will soon advance into the construction phase. I emphasized that the new realities in the region create significant opportunities for developing interregional ties, expanding economic cooperation and connectivity projects.
Dear Minister, dear Baiba,
I would like to thank you once again for the warm welcome, the productive discussions, as well as for your partnership and friendship.
Question. Latvian public broadcaster, Latvian television. A question for the Armenian Minister of Foreign Affairs.
There’s been some recent, most recent, exchange of opinions between Yerevan and Moscow about the military base in Armenia. How do you see, what are your aims in regards to future relations with Russia? How should they go forward? And also with the EU, how do you try to balance it out?
Ararat Mirzoyan. Well, thank you for the question. You know, the foreign policy of the Republic of Armenia is now called, and we largely use this description in our internal political debates, the balancing and balanced policy. We do deepen our partnerships with the United States, with the European Union, with a number of EU member states we have established strategic partnerships.
We are working on deepening our cooperation in various spheres: energy, establishing cooperation for agriculture products, high technologies, AI. With the United States, we have also developed a comprehensive strategic partnership, and we are already seeing tangible benefits from this, including in the fields of AI and many other spheres.
At the same time, we are also interested in keeping our cooperation with Russia in various spheres.
We don’t seek any confrontation. I saw the idea behind the formulation of the question. Yes, we do hear differently, we do get different messages from Moscow regarding the military base.
You know, we don’t see any necessity of keeping this military base in the Republic of Armenia, but we also haven’t initiated a conversation about removing this military base. If the Russian partners are interested in starting this conversation, well, we have an ongoing conversation regarding different infrastructures and the future of cooperation between Armenia and Russia, and we’re ready to enrich this conversation with the topic of the military base as well.
And here, you know, I want to be crystal clear. We don’t want to cut the ties with Russia. We don’t want a confrontation with our Russian partners, but also we see that there are many spheres where we have interests and mutual interests with partners from the United States, from the European Union, European continent, and we do have our own interest to develop cooperations with these partners as well. So we will continue this policy of ours.
If our Russian colleagues see problems here, we’re ready to discuss, but we seek more understanding, and we see more necessity to build the whole foreign policy architecture of Republic of Armenia in a more balancing and balanced way. So this is probably the best answer to your question regarding the military base.
Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Trade of the Republic of Armenia