Another president is under investigation here, Sargsyan, who was the Minister of Defense under Kocharyan, and then became the president. The position of our Foreign Ministry is that we are guided by the interests of the Armenian people. This was stated by Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, responding to RBC’s question about the fact that former Armenian President Robert Kocharyan was detained for two months, as well as his son.
“We see how the interests of the Armenian people have been closely intertwined with the interests of our people for centuries. And always, for very long periods of time, we have been together, in solidarity with each other. Russia has more than once come to the aid of the Armenian people and the leadership of Armenia in difficult situations.
These interests, of course, should prevail. But now the representatives of the current leadership of Yerevan are guided by other issues. The goal of orientation towards the European Union has been declared, a law has been adopted to begin the process of accession to the European Union. The Eurasian Economic Union countries issued a statement at their May summit calling on the Armenian leadership to hold a referendum and decide whether they want to join the European Union or remain in the Eurasian Economic Union. In my opinion, this is a completely justified demand. The norms of one organization are incompatible with the norms of another. This has been discussed many times.
Literally a few days ago, I read that Mr. Pashinyan said that it would be possible to talk about a referendum when an application is submitted to the European Union, there will be a response to it, and a “road map” for that membership will be prepared. That is when the referendum will take place.
"This, in my opinion, speaks of not so much trust in the Armenian voters and the Armenian people. It is necessary to show an honest choice: what do you choose between [EU membership and] how do you live now, when in the last three years the trade turnover has exceeded $6 billion, and in one year it reached $12 billion, and the country has developed thanks to the Eurasian Economic Union," Lavrov noted.
