How will Armenia pay for French weapons? Article by French newspaper Le Monde

The French newspaper Le Monde published an article in which it tried to analyse how Armenia is going to pay for the military contracts concluded with France, Caliber.Az reprints the article.

On October 23, French Minister of the Armed Forces Sebastian Lecornu and his Armenian counterpart Suren Papikyan presented the details of the new "strategic cooperation". The French minister stressed that the supplied weapons would be primarily "defensive" and that it is not about the transfer, as in the case of French military assistance to Ukraine, but about contracts for the supply of equipment in the proper form.

As part of the cooperation announced on October 23, three GM200 radar systems manufactured by Thales will be purchased, designed to detect medium-range air threats (fighters, helicopters, drones, etc.) at a distance of up to 250 km.

An agreement was also signed on the intention to purchase an indefinite number of French man-portable air defence missile systems (MANPADS) "Mistral".

According to Lecornu, from late 2023 to early 2024, French military personnel will be sent to Armenia to train troops based on the method the Ukrainian servicemen are being trained in Poland.

Azerbaijan believes that France's pro-Armenian stance prevents it from acting as a mediator in the peace talks.

It is still unclear how Yerevan will finance the acquisitions announced on October 23, which could amount to several hundred million euros. On October 3, Catherine Colonna offered Armenia to use the European Peace Fund (EPF), a mechanism used to organize military support for Ukraine and Moldova. However, Armenia is still far from being included in the list of potential beneficiaries, since the opinions of the EU member states on this issue differ.