CSTO sneaking up quietly How Russia, EU are tearing Armenia into zones of influence

Russia does clearly not intend to change its course on sending a monitoring mission of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) to the conditional Armenian-Azerbaijani border, seeing as it periodically warns Yerevan that it is obviously not in Moscow’s interest to delay this issue.

At the end of last month, the official spokesperson for the Russian Foreign Ministry, Maria Zakharova said at a briefing that “the deployment of the CSTO mission to the border of Armenia and Azerbaijan would contribute to the stabilization of the situation”, highlighting, however, that the Karabakh region of Azerbaijan does not fall under the organization’s area of responsibility.

“The deployment of the organization’s mission in Armenia would make a significant contribution to the stabilization of the situation at the Armenian-Azerbaijani border..”, Zakharova noted, pointedly adding the following: “Well, the ball is on the Armenian side”. Which basically means that it was made clear to Yerevan that it is all up to itself now.

Earlier, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov said in an interview with journalist Dmitry Kiselyov that the proposal to deploy a CSTO mission to the South Caucasus is still valid. “This proposal is still on the table, and if our Armenian allies, friends are still interested in it, this mission can be deployed within just a day or two”, he informed.

Nevertheless, almost half a year has passed since then, but the matter regarding the mission by the allies of Armenia has not moved from the deadlock, yet in the meanwhile Yerevan has managed to invite an EU reconnaissance and observation mission and station them at the conditional border.

Only recently the Director of the First Department of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) within the Russian Foreign Ministry, Mikael Agasandyan, firmly recalled that the CSTO is ready to go back to negotiating the issue of deployment and is waiting for Yerevan’s reply.

"We are still waiting for a positive response from Yerevan and are ready to resume substantive work on the proposal to deploy the CSTO monitoring mission in the border regions of Armenia, as well as other joint measures of assistance to our ally”, said Agasandyan, as did Zakharov, noting that the adoption of relevant decisions by Yerevan will have a positive impact on the regional situation.

Further, the Russian diplomat went on and even slightly intimidated Armenia, saying that Western countries are trying to exert political and economic pressure on Russia’s closest allies, including Armenia, “in order to inflict maximum damage to Russia and its positions in the South Caucasus”. He even presented Yerevan with an exit route, reiterating that the only way to a sustainable settlement is through the consistent normalization of Armenian-Azerbaijani relations on the basis of negotiations and the willingness of the parties to make compromises, take responsible decisions and implement them.

The following conclusions emerge from the Russian diplomat’s statement. First of all, Moscow has for the umpteenth time indicated to the leadership of its outpost in the South Caucasus that it considers the delay of the Russian initiative to be an outright pandering to the West, which a priori goes beyond the allied framework of Armenian-Russian relations. Secondly, Yerevan was urged not to ignore Moscow’s instructions. As for the CSTO mission, the Russian Federation has been waiting for Armenia to reply to this fundamentally important matter for several months but has not heard anything except the criticism directed at both the bloc and the member states.

The fact that Armenia’s main demand for the CSTO is directly related to the position of the other member states of this organization with an objective position towards Azerbaijan is no secret anymore. As well as the fact that all countries of the bloc support the territorial integrity of our country, the principle of the inviolability of its borders, that is, Karabakh’s belonging to Azerbaijan. However, Yerevan’s bitter resentment towards the allied countries is also related to Azerbaijan. Yerevan cannot forgive them that during the military clashes on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border in September 2022 they did not only keep it waiting for its CSTO allies to provide military assistance but did also not condemn the “aggressive policy of Azerbaijan”. In retaliation for this, Nikol Pashinyan did not sign the declaration of the CSTO Council and the project on joint measures in December of last year to assist Armenia, and in early 2023 completely refused to participate in the exercises of the bloc on its territory. Further on, Armenia maintained the same distanced position regarding the CSTO. Moreover, in May of this year, Pashinyan proudly declared “that the CSTO was leaving Armenia”.

Statements are statements, but Armenia has to yet take decisive steps in this regard. The Republic is still a member of the Eurasian Economic Union and the CSTO and is unlikely to dare to leave them on its own, and there are many reasons for this. On the other hand, Yerevan’s attempts to manipulate the CSTO did not bring the expected results - all the countries of the bloc maintain their unchanged position on the Karabakh settlement, supporting Azerbaijan instead of Armenia. Moscow, on the basis of its dominant position in the CSTO, makes it clear to Yerevan that it will not allow it to leave the orbit of its interests. The Russian side’s insistence on the deployment of a monitoring mission on the Armenian-Azerbaijani border is further confirmed. Therefore, there is reason to believe that Moscow will continue to have a hold on Yerevan. And if we consider that the EU reconnaissance and observation mission has already been deployed on the territory of Armenia, then the presence of representatives of the CSTO will transform the “land of stones” into an arena of confrontation between Russia (and Iran, by the way) and the collective West.