Days earlier than Sunday’s decisive Armenian normal election, the European Fee declared its “agency help” for Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and mentioned it was making ready a help bundle to ease harder Russian financial sanctions on Yerevan for his pro-Western, pro-EU flip.
“By extending export restrictions on Armenian merchandise, Moscow is weaponizing financial ties for political stress,” European Fee President Ursula von der Leyen mentioned in an announcement Thursday.
“We’re properly conscious of this technique. For this reason Europe stands agency in opposition to Armenia,” von der Leyen added.
Von der Leyen mentioned the EU’s help bundle consists of greater than 50 million euros in monetary help (with extra to return) and sensible measures to help Armenia’s agricultural commerce, which is affected by tighter Russian rules.
“A consignment of 10,000 flowers is scheduled to reach in Latvia,” he mentioned on Friday, including that different measures will proceed enterprise ties between the 2 nations, with 7,000 firms already supported beneath the EU-Armenia Resilience and Development Plan agreed in 2024, contributing to the creation of greater than 20,000 jobs.
On the similar time, European Fee Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos mentioned that von der Leyen and Pashinyan had agreed to ascertain a joint EU-Armenia job drive to implement a collection of measures agreed between Brussels and Yerevan.
“Armenia has the potential to grow to be a strategic hub linking Europe, the South Caucasus and Central Asia,” he mentioned, “underscoring Europe’s dedication to realizing the formidable connectivity partnership” concluded on the current EU-Armenia summit.
Prime Minister von der Leyen particularly talked about the “current resumption of commerce routes with Turkey, together with the railway connection by way of Georgia and Turkey” as a “nice step ahead”, indicative of Brussels’ help for Armenia’s determination to normalize relations with Turkey as a part of a broader technique for peace and stability within the South Caucasus area, following the historic peace settlement between Azerbaijan and Armenia.
The EU’s assertion of help echoes a key assertion from US Secretary of State Marco Rubio, who informed the US Congress on Wednesday that he believes there may be “proof” that Russia needs Mr Pashinyan to lose the election “on account of elevated ties with the US”.
Rubio linked his feedback to US President Donald Trump’s current endorsement of Armenia’s prime minister within the upcoming election, following allegations of widespread Russian interference in Armenia’s election marketing campaign in favor of pro-Russian factions searching for to maintain the previous Soviet state in Moscow’s conventional orbit.
The assertion additionally got here days after the Kremlin recalled Yerevan’s ambassador to Armenia “for consultations” over Yerevan’s pro-EU stance. Eventually week’s EAEU summit in Astana, Russia and different member states formally reviewed Armenia’s membership and threatened to droop its membership by December.
“There are not any unsold objects.”
In current weeks, Moscow has launched an financial offensive limiting imports of wine, brandy, and mineral water, in addition to quite a lot of Armenian fruits, greens, flowers, and fish merchandise.
The Kremlin additionally threatened to chop very important oil and fuel provides from Russia to Armenia. Armenia imports greater than 80% of its fuel from Russia.
Armenia’s prime minister introduced on Tuesday that “there will likely be no unsold merchandise” as the federal government has discovered new markets for Armenian merchandise in Europe and different areas.
Pashinyan added: “A number of members of our enterprise delegation are already working, and the primary batches of roses and greens have already been shipped. As soon as they arrive, we’ll say which nations we’ll go to.”
Armenia offered items value 2.5 billion euros to Russia in 2025, roughly one-third of its complete exports. The merchandise Moscow at present restricts span among the nation’s most established meals and agricultural sectors, together with wine, brandy, mineral water, contemporary fruit and greens, flowers, and fish.
Armenia’s well-known wines and brandies are already on sale in Europe, though using the phrase “cognac” is banned on the EU market.
Russia absorbed 72% of Armenian wine exports final 12 months, and gross sales of Armenian brandy in Russia hit a report excessive, whereas demand for white spirits is rising in Europe.
Armenia’s contemporary produce resembling strawberries, apricots, peaches and pomegranates are competitively priced, and the endemic species Sebanmas and Ishkan, that are protected and raised in hatcheries, even have pure patrons within the EU market.
Pashinyan says: “There will likely be no confrontation”
In the meantime, Pashinyan has been making an attempt to ease tensions with Russia in current days, saying on Thursday he had agreed to go to Moscow with Russian President Vladimir Putin to “maintain talks and resolve all present points.”
“We won’t interact in a confrontation with Russia. We are going to calmly defend Armenia’s place,” Pashinyan mentioned at an election occasion in Martuni. “We won’t act in opposition to Russia’s pursuits, however we won’t act in opposition to our personal pursuits both.”
Just some days in the past, he mentioned that Armenia’s accession to the EU was at present “theoretical” and that “we’ll proceed to work calmly and steadily inside the Eurasian Financial Union with out battle. We’re satisfied that there are nonetheless prospects on this course and we’ll reap the benefits of them within the close to future.”
The Armenian prime minister went on to say that whereas “relations with Russia are in a interval of transformation,” he thought of the method “optimistic” and that relations between Armenia and Russia stay “open and sincere, and we don’t go away any darkish corners in our relationships.”
However Pashinyan continued his assaults on Thursday in opposition to his critics and rebels, who he has repeatedly accused of abandoning Karabakh and due to this fact betraying the nation.
“Abandoning Karabakh was my biggest service to Armenia,” he mentioned at a marketing campaign rally. “We’re trapped and if we proceed on this path we’ll lose Armenia and the Armenian state.”
“I knew that they’d name me a traitor, a land giver, and so on. However at the moment I’m very pleased that I discovered the power, stood up, confronted the reality and rescued Armenia from the entice,” the Armenian prime minister mentioned, repeating his earlier assertion that the Karabakh department had closed for Yerevan as Armenia selected to hunt a peaceable future with its former rival Azerbaijan and the broader area.
Pashinyan mentioned it was time for Armenia to look to the longer term, declaring: “We have now no proper to go on this bleeding wound from era to era. We should go on peace to our kids.”
“Right this moment, we’re extra impartial, extra affluent and extra like a nation than ever earlier than,” the Armenian Prime Minister concluded.
