Minsk, 14 February: Delaying the appointment of a new secretary general of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) is detrimental to the Organization, Anatol Hlaz, spokesman for the Belarusian foreign ministry, told reporters in Minsk on Thursday.
"The CSTO has had no secretary general for a long time," Hlaz said. "This situation is not good for the Organization and needs to be resolved as soon as possible, the more so as at meetings in both Astana and Saint Petersburg, heads of state spoke in favour of a candidate representing Belarus."
Hlaz noted that in December 2018, at the request of the president of Kyrgyzstan, who chaired the Collective Security Council, the CSTO Secretariat drew up a draft directive appointing Stanislaw Zas, state secretary of the Security Council of Belarus, to serve as secretary general of the CSTO.
Zas immediately held meetings with heads of state in five capital cities and all the presidents approved of his candidacy, the spokesman said. "In view of the fact that Armenia held parliamentary elections in December last year and then the country formed a government, the fact that the prime minister of Armenia had no opportunity to meet with the Belarusian candidate was met with understanding from us," Hlaz said. "Now this period is over, and therefore we expect the Armenian side to soon notify us of a possible date for such a meeting."
Minsk aims to maintain constructive cooperation with Yerevan in this regard, Hlaz stressed. "We hope we'll reach a mutual understanding," he said. "The post of secretary general in an international military and political organization is not a hotel room that can be booked."
On 21 December 2018, Alyaksandr Lukashenka formally approved the potential appointment of General Zas as secretary general of the CSTO following Zas' visits to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Russia.
Zas told the Belarusian leader that the presidents of those CSTO member countries had given their consent to his appointment.
"I formerly said that Belarus had several candidates for the position, but I eventually chose to nominate Zas in order to show that our organization should switch from appointing retired generals – I don't want to say anything bad about them – to appointing young and promising active generals in order to give weight to the organization," Lukashenka said.
However, the Armenian foreign ministry's spokesperson Anna Naghdalyan made it clear that Yerevan was not going to give its consent to the appointment of Zas. She said in December that Armenian authorities were still discussing the issue, and that Zas was not expected to visit Armenia soon.
While speaking to reporters in Saint Petersburg on 6 Decembe, Lukashenka claimed that the issue of the appointment of a new CSTO secretary general had been resolved.
"Unexpectedly, we almost held a CSTO meeting today and actually solved the problem regarding the appointment of a secretary general," Lukashenka said. "A representative of Belarus [will become the new secretary general], as [Kazakhstan's President] Nurusltan Abishevich [Nazarbayev] said earlier."
Lukashenka's allegation was denied by Arman Yeghoyan, spokesman for the acting prime minister of Armenia, Nikol Pashinyan.
"There was no CSTO meeting," Yeghoyan said. "Armenia's position on the matter remains unchanged."
The previous CSTO secretary general, Yuri Khachaturov of Armenia, was recalled by Yerevan on 2 November after just a year and a half in the position instead of three years.
General Khachaturov, who was chief of staff of the Armenian Armed Forces from 2008 to 2016, was recalled because the new Armenian government had charged him with an attempted state coup, along with former President Robert Kocharyan.
Yerevan intended to propose another candidate for the job, but the CSTO rules of procedure did not have a clear provision as to what should happen if someone is recalled from the position.
Following the CSTO's 8 November summit in Kazakhstan's Astana, the Kazakh president said that a representative of Belarus should become the new secretary general of the Organization because Armenia is followed alphabetically by Belarus.
The issue of the appointment of a new secretary general was expected to be discussed at a CSTO summit in Saint Petersburg on 6 December, but the summit was cancelled at the request of Armenia.
Pashinyan said on 2 December, the issue of the appointment of a new CSTO secretary general would not be resolved until after the end of 2018. "There is no consensus on this issue," he said.
Yerevan would like a representative of Armenia to hold this position in the remaining year and a half.