Russian President Vladimir Putin has noted the high economic effect of Armenia’s integration with the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), TASS reports.

“Armenia for us is a strategic partner in the Caucasus and we systematically build our relations of alliance along the most sensitive lines and in the international scene, the CIS space first and foremost,” Putin said during narrow format negotiations with his Armenian counterpart Serzh Sargsyan on Wednesday.

“Incidentally, I was very pleased to see that and I would like to congratulate you. I’ve taken a look at last year’s statistics. Since Armenia joined the EAEU your GDP has grown 10%,” Putin said.

He believes this is a very positive sign. Putin voiced the hope that the positive trend will be preserved.

At the beginning of the meeting Sargsyan said that in the course of his working visit to Moscow he was going to discuss with Putin current interaction between the two countries and to exchange opinion of various issues on the regional agenda. Sargsyan said that in January-June 2016 Russian-Armenian trade was up 12% and commodity export to Russia reached a record-high. He attributed the growth to Armenia’s accession to the EAEU. Sargsyan said his country had no major problems in bilateral relations with Russia.

Armenia joined the EAEU in 2015.

Putin added that he will inform Serzh Sargsyan about the results of the talks on the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement with Azerbaijani leader Ilham Aliyev.

“I met with Azerbaijani President (Ilham) Aliyev in Baku just recently, and, of course, we could not overlook the issue you’ve just mentioned – the Nagorno-Karabakh settlement,” Putin said opening talks with the Armenian leader. “Of course, I will be glad to inform you about the results of our talks in Baku.”

The Russian and Azerbaijani presidents held talks in Baku on August 8.