SERGE SARGSIAN: ARMENIAN-RUSSIAN MILITARY ALLIANCE HAS NO ALTERNATE

Azg/arm
18 Dec 04

Serge Sargsian, minister of defense of Armenia, stated yesterday
that the Armenia-NATO relations will develop so far as “they do not
contradict the Collective Security Treaty (CST)”.

There is no need to include the NATO membership in Armenia’s foreign
policy agenda today but this does not mean that we should not develop
our relations with the Organization, Sargsian said during a round
table organized to discuss issues of regional security.

The Yerevan-Brussels relations mark obvious progress during the
last few years. Speaking of the range of Armenia-NATO relations,
Sargsian said that Armenia has participated in 47 arrangements and
5 military exercises of the Organization in 2004 and is going to
increase these numbers.

Armenian political leaders, Russian and US representatives took part
at the round table. Serge Sargsian took time to speak of Armenia-NATO,
Armenia-Russia, Armenia-EU relations as well as the systems of regional
security separately.

“The Armenia-Russian military alliance has no alternate today”,
he said adding that the Armenian-Russian relations cannot hinder
Armenia’s integration into Europe especially in case when Russia
and Europe come closer. The minister noted that the Armenian-Russian
military cooperation is fixed on 6 dozens of pages.

Serge Sargsian highlighted Armenia-EU relations as key one. Our
country exports 40 percent of its goods to Europe. He underscored
the “brilliant military cooperation” of Armenian-Greek peacekeepers
in Kosovo.

The minister of defense noted that Armenia is the only country in the
South Caucasus that manages to implement balanced policy. He thinks
cooperation in the region will be one day possible and reminded that
such European states as England, France and Germany have history of
century-long enmity but today they are allies.

Levon Mkrtchian, representative of the Armenian Revolutionary
Party, added to more trends of cooperation to those mentioned
by the minister. He singled out relation with Iran and the Arab
world. Mkrtchian reminded two facts from the past: firstly, Iran
provided the only road to Armenia when it was blockaded from 3 sides,
secondly by taking a neutral stance in the Karabakh conflict, Tehran
prevented it to turn into a religious one, something Azerbaijan
strived for.

By Tatoul Hakobian