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EurasiaNet.org
Sept 2 2014
Putin Gives Nod for Armenia's Eurasian-Union Membership
September 2, 2014 - 8:29am, by Giorgi Lomsadze
Russia's Vladimir Putin has issued an ukaz on authorizing an agreement
to accept Armenia into the Eurasian Union, a planned back-in-the-USSR
bloc, but this may or may not make Armenia's membership actually
happen.
Armenia's membership in the Russian- championed Eurasian Union, and
its already active element, the Customs Union, has long smacked of a
Nordic epic song, with multiple characters and events putting the
spokes in Armenia's wheel. Customs-Union members Belarus and
Kazakhstan are Armenia skeptics, and generally less keen about the
Kremlin's everyone-with-a-Soviet-past-is-welcome policy.
Putin's September 1 order, though, includes unnamed, "minor" changes
to the terms of Armenia's membership. It is unclear if this refers to
concessions on the Armenian-championed breakaway territory of
Nagorno-Karabakh. Kazakhstan, with an eye to Turkic ally, Azerbaijan,
which claims Karabakh as its own, strongly opposes Armenia's attempts
to bring breakaway Karabakh into the Customs Union..
Recent statements by both Putin and Kazakh President Nursultan
Nazarbayev, though moderated by courtesies, suggest a muffled
disagreement between Moscow and Astana. Some believe that Russia's
stance on Armenia and its campaign in Ukraine have contributed to the
reported chill.
Nazarbayev said that he would quit the Eurasian Union if the terms of
membership are changed or if the membership poses threat to
Kazakhstan's independent statehood. Putin issued a reminder that
Kazakhstan "had never had statehood" before Nazarbayev.
In the meantime, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev cancelled a
trip to Yerevan, and the planned talks about Armenia's membership were
postponed to a summit in Minsk in October. Armenian Foreign Minister
Eduard Nalbandian insisted that Armenian membership in the Eurasian
Union and its structures remains a work in progress.
http://www.eurasianet.org/node/69786
Sept 2 2014
Putin Gives Nod for Armenia's Eurasian-Union Membership
September 2, 2014 - 8:29am, by Giorgi Lomsadze
Russia's Vladimir Putin has issued an ukaz on authorizing an agreement
to accept Armenia into the Eurasian Union, a planned back-in-the-USSR
bloc, but this may or may not make Armenia's membership actually
happen.
Armenia's membership in the Russian- championed Eurasian Union, and
its already active element, the Customs Union, has long smacked of a
Nordic epic song, with multiple characters and events putting the
spokes in Armenia's wheel. Customs-Union members Belarus and
Kazakhstan are Armenia skeptics, and generally less keen about the
Kremlin's everyone-with-a-Soviet-past-is-welcome policy.
Putin's September 1 order, though, includes unnamed, "minor" changes
to the terms of Armenia's membership. It is unclear if this refers to
concessions on the Armenian-championed breakaway territory of
Nagorno-Karabakh. Kazakhstan, with an eye to Turkic ally, Azerbaijan,
which claims Karabakh as its own, strongly opposes Armenia's attempts
to bring breakaway Karabakh into the Customs Union..
Recent statements by both Putin and Kazakh President Nursultan
Nazarbayev, though moderated by courtesies, suggest a muffled
disagreement between Moscow and Astana. Some believe that Russia's
stance on Armenia and its campaign in Ukraine have contributed to the
reported chill.
Nazarbayev said that he would quit the Eurasian Union if the terms of
membership are changed or if the membership poses threat to
Kazakhstan's independent statehood. Putin issued a reminder that
Kazakhstan "had never had statehood" before Nazarbayev.
In the meantime, Russian Prime Minister Dmitry Medvedev cancelled a
trip to Yerevan, and the planned talks about Armenia's membership were
postponed to a summit in Minsk in October. Armenian Foreign Minister
Eduard Nalbandian insisted that Armenian membership in the Eurasian
Union and its structures remains a work in progress.
http://www.eurasianet.org/node/69786