Armenia becomes pawn in big game
Expert opinions on Caliber.Az

INTERVIEWS  24 March 2024 - 09:48

The Armenian parliament has ratified an agreement between Yerevan and the European Union on the status of the EU civilian observation mission on the conditional border with Azerbaijan.

"Fifty-seven MPs voted in favour, none against, 27 abstained. The decision has been adopted," said parliamentary deputy speaker Ruben Rubinyan. Part of the deputies from the opposition faction "Armenia" abstained, the faction of the opposition "I have the honour" did not take part in the voting.

Thus, Yerevan has legalized the complete independence of European spies from the laws of Armenia, and the EU intelligence and surveillance mission will acquire the so-called "royal status", as Armenian media say. The members of the EU mission will be granted unlimited rights and broad immunity, in particular, it is forbidden to arrest or detain them. According to the Armenian media, even the leaders and deputies of the country do not have such immunity in Armenia.

So where is Armenia heading? Caliber.Az correspondent turned to foreign experts with this question.

According to Roman Gurevich, honorary ambassador of the World Jewish Agency Sohnut, Israeli political scientist and journalist, history shows that the leaders of Armenia often make the most wrong decisions, which can later turn out to be detrimental to the entire Armenian people.

"It is no secret that Armenia has a Russian military base on its territory, and its borders are guarded by Russian border guards. And now Armenia is deliberately reorienting towards the West because it believes that Russia has weakened and it is time to look for new patrons. There is a clear feeling that politicians in Armenia are discussing prospects with great vigour, completely forgetting that traitors usually have only one path. Traitors are used, it is an extremely convenient tool, but in the future, their fate may be unenviable.

Now that Armenia sends its military to study in France and has granted EU observers a special ‘royal’ status, it would be naive to believe that the embrace of the West into which it has thrown itself will save it in the same way that Russia did. The West is in fact pursuing only its own interests and is currently fighting Russia, using Armenia as an auxiliary tool. However, Armenia vainly underestimates Russia's power and influence - France and the U.S. are far away, and Russia is close by. And unreasonable policy of the Armenian leadership can be detrimental to the Armenian people," the expert emphasized.

According to him, Armenia has become a pawn in a big game and can easily be sacrificed.

"Not everyone is given the ability to pursue a multi-vector policy, which is pursued by Azerbaijan, which has learned from experience. It is simply better for Yerevan not to try to repeat such a thing, and it is more reasonable to sit down at the negotiating table and accept everything that Azerbaijan offers," the political scientist noted.

At the same time, according to Kazakh political scientist Ruslan Salikhov, Pashinyan is already demonstrating that he has lost control of his geopolitical split on two chairs.

"The problem of the Armenian leadership is that it completely underestimates the risks of its adventures. That is, the situation is such that Pashinyan does not even have a reliable pool of experts in his cabinet who could assess the consequences of any actions for Armenia. All this resembles delusional guessing at coffee grounds. At the moment Yerevan has only conditional promises of support from European leaders as a safety net, but these promises are only valid for one or two days. If tomorrow the situation changes and Russia, for example, decides to "press" Armenia by closing access to its market or closing the gas pipe, the position of European politicians may change dramatically. It will turn out that they are not responsible for anything and all these were beautiful words. And then they will consult for weeks and discuss whether to help Yerevan or not," the Kazakh political scientist said.

Caliber.Az