Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan visited the Atlantic Council in Washington, where he made a speech. The Prime Minister first answered the questions of the Senior Director of the Atlantic Council of Eurasia, former US Ambassador to Uzbekistan and former US Ambassador to Ukraine John Herbs. Then the meeting was held in a closed format, within the framework of which Nikol Pashinyan answered a number of experts' questions.
Below is the speech of Prime Minister Pashinyan and the question and answer to the question and answer with John Herbst.
Senior Director of the Eurasian Center of Atlantic, Ambassador John Herbst
- I am honored today to host His Excellency Mr. Pashinyan, the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia. Today a very interesting dialogue will take place.
The Prime Minister is headed by his country, from the 2018 velvet revolution, which brought a great democratic change for Armenia. Since then, he has led his country through the wound period, held snap elections in 2021.
Being a journalist by profession, Mr. Prime Minister is now trying to write a new story for Armenia and his future. A future where peace and normal relations with their neighbors will respect sovereignty and territorial integrity and a future where the United States, the West, will be interested in cooperation with Armenia.
There is already a new US-Armenia strategic partnership, which is a big step forward for Armenia's future and Washington-Yerevan relations. Accept my congratulations, Prime Minister Pashinyan and Foreign Minister Mirzoyan for this development. This cooperation is clearly in the interests of both Armenia and the United States. Thus, I invite Mr. Prime Minister to speak out of the podium, after which there will be a discussion.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan
- Dear Mr. Herbst, Dear Representatives of Analytical Centers, I am glad to discuss the foreign policy of the Republic of Armenia with you. The Armenian government has adopted a foreign policy that we call a balanced and balancing foreign policy. At the heart of this policy is to increase the level of independence and sovereignty of the Republic of Armenia.
When we thought about the rise in independence, we came to the conclusion that it means replacing few dependence on many dependence.
Now we operate within the framework of this resolution. Of course, we are first of all focused on our regional relations, because to what extent we will be safe, how reliable our security system will be reliable, depending on the fourths of our country. I speak about our borders with Turkey and Azerbaijan. We have two more borders with Georgia and Iran.
Of course, these two borders are very important for us, we have good relations with our two neighbors, Georgia and Iran, but we want to open a new era in our relations with Azerbaijan. We have made huge progress with Azerbaijan. In the process. In order for this progress to you, you know that we are discussing the draft peace agreement with Azerbaijan now, and now we have two points about the total agreement, which will still be reached.
We hope to complete this process as soon as possible. Of course, we are working with Azerbaijan in a bilateral format, but obviously the international community's attention and support would be very useful for forming a proper environment in achieving peace. We have a rather active dialogue with Turkey. In recent years, I have had several meetings with the Turkish President's inauguration ceremony, recently we have met in New York, and we have a very specific agreement, open our border in the first stage. For people holding a passport, we hope to achieve this agreement as soon as possible. We work in that direction.
On the other hand, we deepen cooperation with other regional partners, I mean, Georgia and Iran. Of course, there is an international situation that hinders the deepening of relations with our neighbors, and these circumstances are known to everyone, I will not mention them.
But I think we manage to take into account all these circumstances, and on the other hand, develop relations with their neighbors. Of course, we hope that in our regional situation it will be a breakthrough with Azerbaijan to be finalized and signed, as well as to reach relations with Turkey, which will not only fully change the region, but also very tangible and very tangible. We will have a significant impact on the international situation. We continue to be a member of the Eurasian Economic Union. I would appreciate our relations at the Eurasian Economic Union. The Eurasian Economic Union operates and we work within its framework. On the other hand, we have suspended our participation in the CSTO, which was our main security partner. The reason for this decision was the situation when the CSTO did not fulfill its responsibilities to guarantee the security of the Republic of Armenia.
In general, I must say that now we are in the process of diversifying our foreign relations, from the economy to security. Had. Since 2022, the civil observation mission has been located on the Armenia-Azerbaijan border, and this is the first time that the European Union has participated in the security agenda of the Republic of Armenia. We are developing cooperation with the European Union.
We have recently launched a dialogue on visa liberalization, and we hope to be completed as soon as possible. Recently, we signed a strategic cooperation charter with the United States, which is also a very important decision. We hope to open a new page in relations with the United States. We are actively working on foreign policy, and the implementation of balanced and balancing policy is in the process. I think we do it quite effectively. Frankly, I can say that despite all the challenges, we have been able to raise our level of independence and sovereignty, and I usually say that Armenia is becoming more and more independent, which is very important. It opens new opportunities for us, but of course lead to new challenges. Opportunities, and our task is to manage all the challenges and use the opportunities as much as possible. I will consider the attention of this audience to a very important topic that is democracy. It is very important to emphasize the fact that now Armenia is developing democracy.
This is very important and the international community adopts this fact. I think this circumstance, I mean democracy, has a very important impact on our foreign policy, because when the country is democratic, it will clearly try to deepen cooperation with all other democracies, and we hope for our pursuit will be bilateral. In fact, we see it and appreciate. We will continue the agenda of democratic reforms.
Of course, as everywhere, democracy brings challenges, but we also open opportunities, and we are trying to manage all the challenges, including all opportunities to develop our country, keeping the safety agenda. We see prosperity and happiness, freedom, protection of human rights, independent judiciary, and in general the success of our citizens. We want them to feel that democracy is a factor that is able to provide security, prosperity, more and more opportunities for all citizens and all people living in Armenia. We hope that as a result of these reforms, Armenia will become a more attractive country for investment, living and visiting. This is our policy that we are trying to advance.
Of course, we feel that Armenia's visibility is growing, but on the other hand, we hope to provide more visibility, more support from our international colleagues, the success of Armenia's success in democracy, challenges and security. Make the history of threats more visible to the international community, which I think may be a factor of stability and peace for our country and the region. I tried to introduce a common picture of our country and our region and now I am ready to answer all your questions. Thank you.
