Netgazeti, Georgia
Dec 11 2017
Armenia's agreement with the EU without confrontation with Moscow
Mikayel Zolyan
[Armenian News note: the below is translated from Georgian]
How did Armenia and the EU sign the agreement without any complications?
Armenia and the EU signed the Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement on 24 November 2017. A pundit, whom I know, won a bottle of cognac. His colleague, who lost the bet, argued that the signing of the agreement would be thwarted.
People in Yerevan were impatiently waiting until the last moment for what was going to happen at the Eastern Partnership summit in Brussels. When the news about the signing of the agreement was disseminated, Armenians had a joyful mood in social networks like the one they would have had Armenia's national football team won a landslide victory. However, the rejoicings continued until Russian TV stations voiced humiliating messages regarding Armenians.
For example, well-known Russian pundit Maxim Shevchenko referred to [Azerbaijan's breakaway] Karabakh as Azerbaijani territory in the "Time will Tell" programme of a Russian TV station and in the "Meeting Place" programme of NTV, Russian experts compared Armenia with an unfaithful wife, because being a member of the [Russian-led] Eurasian Economic Union [EEU], it signed an agreement with the EU.
Why did history not repeat itself?
Why was such a stir raised over the technical document on 400 pages? The problem is that everyone remembers what happened in 2013, when the text of the association agreement between Armenia and the EU was ready. That agreement included Armenia's joining the DCFTA [Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Areas]. On 3 September, Armenia expressed the desire to join the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus, and Kazakhstan, which made it impossible to sign the agreement with the EU.
The Armenian government's statement that they were ready to sign the association agreement without the DCFTA was nothing other than a clumsy attempt "not to lose face" and to place responsibility on the EU.
However, it was clear to effectively everyone that the real reason for the refusal to sign the agreement was pressure on the part of Moscow, which the Armenian government failed to resist.
Things were different this time, but now too, like in 2013, signals were received from Russia that they were not satisfied with developing relations between Armenia and the EU.
The most vivid example of this was a TV programme broadcast by the Zvezda TV station affiliated to the Russian Defence Ministry, where the anchor said that "Armenia plans to join the EU", accused Armenia's national hero Garegin Nzhdeh [nickname meaning "pilgrim", "emigrant" of Garegin Ter-Harutyunyan (1886-1955), who instrumented the establishment of the Republic of Mountainous Armenia, an anti-Bolshevik state and during World War II assisted the Armenian Legion of the armed forces of Nazi Germany, hoping that if Germany succeeded in conquering the USSR, they would be able to grant Armenia independence] of being a Nazi and calling him "Armenia's [Stepan] Bandera, [the commander-in-chief of the Ukrainian Insurgent Army]", [later, Zvezda apologised and deleted the programme from the YouTube channel] [second square brackets as published].
There were several incidents, including programmes on ORT and NTV, after the agreement was signed, but all this has had no major results despite battles on the fields of Facebook and a certain rise in anti-Russian sentiments in Armenia.
Moreover, Russia showed restraint at the official level and effectively left without reaction the fact that the agreement was signed. A few days ahead of the Brussels summit, [Armenian President] Serzh Sargsyan paid an official visit to Moscow and met [Russian] President Vladimir Putin there. This visit was supposed to show that "Armenia does not forget strategic partners and the development of relations with the EU is going to have no impact on relations with Moscow".
On the other hand, some analysts even said in their statements that the agreement between the EU and Armenia was in Moscow's interests, as it fits well the logic that integration between the EU and the [Russian-led] Eurasian Union [EEU] is also possible.
Why did Moscow not take any steps unlike in 2013 in order to halt the signing of the agreement? The thing is that the document of this year is essentially different from the document of 2013 and the agreements the EU signed with Georgia, Ukraine, and Moldova.
Armenia, a member of the EEU, cannot have even a theoretical chance of joining the DCFTA. Thus, the document signed on 24 November is not so ambitious and Moscow's calm reaction is due to this.
However, this is not the only reason. The current situation is fundamentally different from that in 2013 due to the dynamic of relations between Russia and the West. The future of Ukraine was decided in 2013 and each side was trying to "lure away" Kiev.
In this context, it was important for Russia to hinder the agreement between the EU and Armenia and put Kiev under pressure in this manner and, at the same time, to show the EU that it is impossible to work with post-Soviet countries without taking Moscow's interests into account.
The situation is different today. The peak of the conflict has fallen behind. Russia has finally lost Ukraine [at any rate, in the immediate future] [square brackets as published], the West has introduced sanctions, and prices of energy resources have fallen. In these conditions, Moscow is unable to offer "crackers" to post-Soviet countries, including Armenia, and force them to renounce relations with the EU.
At the same time, the policy of tough pressure has made relations with the EU more complicated and Russia does not want this today. In addition, Moscow is now working on the idea of "integrating integration" between the EU and the EEU. The agreement between Armenia and the EEU also fits in this plan.
What is going to happen next?
What benefits is Armenia going to receive from signing the agreement? This will first and foremost facilitate more financial support for Armenia. As the EU envoy [head of the EU Delegation] to Armenia, Piotr Switalski, said, EU's financial support for Armenia is going to increase by 25 per cent next year and presumably, the figures will grow.
Also, the agreement is going to create conditions for dialogue on visa-free travel. It is clear that there is much time left until Armenian citizens are able to travel to EU countries without visas like citizens of Georgia, Moldova, and Ukraine – at least two or three years according to most optimistic estimates. However, the process has started.
It was also announced at the Eastern Partnership summit that Armenia and the EU had also finalised the text of the agreement of air communications, which is supposed to make air travel to Europe more active [today, there are only a few flights from Yerevan to EU countries and most passengers travel via Russia] [square brackets as published].
However, it is most important that the aforementioned agreement envisages major reforms in various spheres in Armenia, including administrative management, the judiciary system, economy, and education. Experience has shown that we should not rely on the government's goodwill in this regard.
Without pressure from society, these reforms are going to remain simply ink on paper. Therefore, the opposition parliamentary bloc Yelk [Way out] has already said that it intends to monitor the implementation of the agreement between Armenia and the EU.
The attitude of civic society organisations is the same. It is difficult to say how efficient such monitoring can be, but one thing is clear: Prospects for progress have appeared for Armenia thanks to the agreement with the EU.