Tweet
ARMENIA SEEKS STRONGER EU STANCE ON KARABAKH
By Andrew Gardner
European Voice
http://www.europeanvoice.com/article/2012/june/armenia-seeks-stronger-eu-stance-on-karabakh/74509.aspx
June 5 2012
Call by Armenia's prime minister follows reports of an Azeri incursion.
Armenia's prime minister, Tigran Sargsyan, has called for the EU to
issue a three-point resolution to Azerbaijan in a bid to curb the
militarisation of the south Caucasus. At the end of a two-day visit to
Brussels (3-4 June), just two days after his re-appointment as prime
minister, Sargsyan told European Voice that the EU should draw up a
declaration stipulating that the festering dispute over the status of
Nagorno-Karabakh must be resolved peacefully, threatening sanctions
if force is used and setting out what those sanctions would be.
Sargsyan's comments - when asked by European Voice what would be
the greatest contribution that the EU could make in the region in
the coming year - followed an incident early yesterday (3 June) in
which Armenia says that three of its soldiers were killed during an
incursion by Azeri soldiers in the Tavush region of north-eastern
Armenia, far from Nagorno-Karabakh.
According to agency reports, Azerbaijan's defence ministry said the
soldiers had been shot by Armenian colleagues.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who was in Armenia yesterday,
said that she was "very concerned about the danger of escalation of
tensions". After another incident in the Tavush region in April, the
US, Russia and France - who are leading efforts to end the dispute
over Karabakh - called for an end to "such senseless acts".
Sargsyan's statement comes against the backdrop of years of heavy
defence spending by Azerbaijan and, to a substantially lesser degree,
by Armenia.
Sargsyan also claimed that Azerbaijan has been seeking to undermine
the work of the Minsk Group of countries, set up in 1992 by what is
now the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)
to end the war and resolve the dispute.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute,
Azerbaijan increased military spending by 88% in 2011, the largest
increase in the world.
Sargsyan said that Armenia was strong enough to maintain a balance
of military power.
In 2010, Armenia signed an agreement with Russia that would allow
Russia to station troops in Armenia for 44 years.
Relations with the EU
Sargsyan was in Brussels for a gathering of national parties that
belong to the European People's Party (EPP), a reflection of Armenian
parties' deepening integration into European politics. Sargsyan's
Republican Party of Armenia, whose leader is President Serzh Sargsyan,
became an observer of the EPP grouping in February, as did two other
parties. The Pan-Armenian National Movement has been a member of the
European Liberal Democrats movement since 2010.
Sargsyan's visit, his first foreign trip since being named on 2 June as
prime minister by President Sargsyan, comes shortly before the latest
step in Armenia's relationship with the EU: the start of negotiations
on a 'deep and comprehensive free-trade agreement' (DCFTA).
The talks, which will begin within two weeks, had been expected
to start in 2011, but were delayed when the EU demanded changes to
Armenia's method of valuing imports and its tax on imported alcohol.
They are likely to take some time, with EU regulations on food safety a
particularly tricky challenge for Armenia. Sargsyan said these would
require new infrastructure in Armenia.
Armenia's bid for closer relations with the EU potentially puts it
at cross-purposes with Russia, whose president, Vladimir Putin, has
indicated that he plans to step up efforts to establish a Eurasian
Union, a bloc of former Soviet states that could, in effect, act as
a counterpoint to the EU. Sargsyan emphasised, however, that he sees
Armenia's relations with Russia and the EU as complementary.
Sargsyan said that Armenia did not have an interest in joining the
Eurasian Union, which was established in January 2010 and which will
later this year free the movement of trade, capital and workers across
its three member states - Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus. Last October,
Armenia signed a free-trade agreement with the three members of the
union, as well as Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Tajikistan, a deal
that he likened in nature to the EU's DCFTA. Another element of the
Eurasian Union - a customs union - would be "pointless", he said,
as Armenia does not have a border with the three countries.
A customs union with Russia would hamper Armenia's efforts to integrate
its market with the EU, which in 2010 accounted for 32% of Armenia's
trade, compared with 20.8% for Russia.
He foresaw "no fundamental change" in Armenia's relationship with
Russia following Putin's return to office, and dismissed suggestions
of coolness in the relationship between the Russian and Armenian
presidents caused partly by Serzh Sargsyan's decision to give a medal
in 2009 to Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili. Months earlier,
in August 2008, Russia and Georgia fought a brief war after Georgian
forces entered the self-declared republic of South Ossetia.
"Such a high-level relationship cannot be conditioned by such a tiny
matter," Sargsyan said.
Sargsyan's Republican Party emerged with a strengthened mandate
from elections on 6 May, winning 44.3% of the vote and 70 seats in
the 131-member parliament, ten percentage points and seven seats
more than in 2007. Observers from the Organisation for Security and
Co-operation in Europe noted flaws in the elections, but praised its
competitiveness. The elections were seen as the best held in Armenia
in the 21 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In a speech at the Centre for European Policy Studies, Sargsyan,
who has been in office since 2008, spoke with some pride about his
government's efforts to increase transparency and e-government. But
his emphasis was on the challenges ahead. Armenians are among the
"most unpleased" - discontented - people in the world, he said,
adding: "Their unpleasedness is the potential that will help us to
bridge the gap between our reality and our values."
By Andrew Gardner
European Voice
http://www.europeanvoice.com/article/2012/june/armenia-seeks-stronger-eu-stance-on-karabakh/74509.aspx
June 5 2012
Call by Armenia's prime minister follows reports of an Azeri incursion.
Armenia's prime minister, Tigran Sargsyan, has called for the EU to
issue a three-point resolution to Azerbaijan in a bid to curb the
militarisation of the south Caucasus. At the end of a two-day visit to
Brussels (3-4 June), just two days after his re-appointment as prime
minister, Sargsyan told European Voice that the EU should draw up a
declaration stipulating that the festering dispute over the status of
Nagorno-Karabakh must be resolved peacefully, threatening sanctions
if force is used and setting out what those sanctions would be.
Sargsyan's comments - when asked by European Voice what would be
the greatest contribution that the EU could make in the region in
the coming year - followed an incident early yesterday (3 June) in
which Armenia says that three of its soldiers were killed during an
incursion by Azeri soldiers in the Tavush region of north-eastern
Armenia, far from Nagorno-Karabakh.
According to agency reports, Azerbaijan's defence ministry said the
soldiers had been shot by Armenian colleagues.
US Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, who was in Armenia yesterday,
said that she was "very concerned about the danger of escalation of
tensions". After another incident in the Tavush region in April, the
US, Russia and France - who are leading efforts to end the dispute
over Karabakh - called for an end to "such senseless acts".
Sargsyan's statement comes against the backdrop of years of heavy
defence spending by Azerbaijan and, to a substantially lesser degree,
by Armenia.
Sargsyan also claimed that Azerbaijan has been seeking to undermine
the work of the Minsk Group of countries, set up in 1992 by what is
now the Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE)
to end the war and resolve the dispute.
According to the Stockholm International Peace Research Institute,
Azerbaijan increased military spending by 88% in 2011, the largest
increase in the world.
Sargsyan said that Armenia was strong enough to maintain a balance
of military power.
In 2010, Armenia signed an agreement with Russia that would allow
Russia to station troops in Armenia for 44 years.
Relations with the EU
Sargsyan was in Brussels for a gathering of national parties that
belong to the European People's Party (EPP), a reflection of Armenian
parties' deepening integration into European politics. Sargsyan's
Republican Party of Armenia, whose leader is President Serzh Sargsyan,
became an observer of the EPP grouping in February, as did two other
parties. The Pan-Armenian National Movement has been a member of the
European Liberal Democrats movement since 2010.
Sargsyan's visit, his first foreign trip since being named on 2 June as
prime minister by President Sargsyan, comes shortly before the latest
step in Armenia's relationship with the EU: the start of negotiations
on a 'deep and comprehensive free-trade agreement' (DCFTA).
The talks, which will begin within two weeks, had been expected
to start in 2011, but were delayed when the EU demanded changes to
Armenia's method of valuing imports and its tax on imported alcohol.
They are likely to take some time, with EU regulations on food safety a
particularly tricky challenge for Armenia. Sargsyan said these would
require new infrastructure in Armenia.
Armenia's bid for closer relations with the EU potentially puts it
at cross-purposes with Russia, whose president, Vladimir Putin, has
indicated that he plans to step up efforts to establish a Eurasian
Union, a bloc of former Soviet states that could, in effect, act as
a counterpoint to the EU. Sargsyan emphasised, however, that he sees
Armenia's relations with Russia and the EU as complementary.
Sargsyan said that Armenia did not have an interest in joining the
Eurasian Union, which was established in January 2010 and which will
later this year free the movement of trade, capital and workers across
its three member states - Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus. Last October,
Armenia signed a free-trade agreement with the three members of the
union, as well as Ukraine, Kyrgyzstan, Moldova and Tajikistan, a deal
that he likened in nature to the EU's DCFTA. Another element of the
Eurasian Union - a customs union - would be "pointless", he said,
as Armenia does not have a border with the three countries.
A customs union with Russia would hamper Armenia's efforts to integrate
its market with the EU, which in 2010 accounted for 32% of Armenia's
trade, compared with 20.8% for Russia.
He foresaw "no fundamental change" in Armenia's relationship with
Russia following Putin's return to office, and dismissed suggestions
of coolness in the relationship between the Russian and Armenian
presidents caused partly by Serzh Sargsyan's decision to give a medal
in 2009 to Georgia's President Mikheil Saakashvili. Months earlier,
in August 2008, Russia and Georgia fought a brief war after Georgian
forces entered the self-declared republic of South Ossetia.
"Such a high-level relationship cannot be conditioned by such a tiny
matter," Sargsyan said.
Sargsyan's Republican Party emerged with a strengthened mandate
from elections on 6 May, winning 44.3% of the vote and 70 seats in
the 131-member parliament, ten percentage points and seven seats
more than in 2007. Observers from the Organisation for Security and
Co-operation in Europe noted flaws in the elections, but praised its
competitiveness. The elections were seen as the best held in Armenia
in the 21 years since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In a speech at the Centre for European Policy Studies, Sargsyan,
who has been in office since 2008, spoke with some pride about his
government's efforts to increase transparency and e-government. But
his emphasis was on the challenges ahead. Armenians are among the
"most unpleased" - discontented - people in the world, he said,
adding: "Their unpleasedness is the potential that will help us to
bridge the gap between our reality and our values."