Pashinyan allowed Armenia to withdraw from the CSTO

Armenia can withdraw from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) if the organization itself leaves the republic. Prime Minister of the Republic Nikol Pashinyan told journalists about this transmits portal 168.am.

“Our perception is that the CSTO has left or is leaving Armenia. In other words, if Armenia de jure decides to withdraw from the CSTO, then this will happen as a result of the fact that the CSTO has withdrawn from Armenia … I do not exclude that Armenia may de jure decide to suspend or freeze its membership in the CSTO.” , he said.

If the CSTO leaves Armenia, then Yerevan will decide its own security issues on its own, the prime minister added.

Earlier on May 16, Deputy Foreign Minister of Armenia Mnatsakan Safaryan said that the Security Council of the Republic discussed withdrawal from the CSTO, but now this is not being discussed.

On April 20, Pashinyan announced Yerevan’s readiness to deploy a CSTO mission on the border with Azerbaijan. The readiness to send such a mission on March 31 was announced by the representative of the secretariat of the organization, Yuri Shuvalov, following an expanded meeting of the leadership at the CSTO headquarters. Before that, on March 14, Pashinyanannouncedthat Armenia is not going to leave the CSTO, but the organization itself, “wishing it or not, leaves Armenia.” He also said that the Armenian side is not going to appoint its representative as deputy chairman of the CSTO.

At the end of last year, Pashinyan refused to sign the declaration of the CSTO Council and the draft on joint measures to provide assistance to Armenia. The prime minister explained his decision by the fact that the draft was incomplete and does not contain a political assessment of Azerbaijan’s aggressive actions in Nagorno-Karabakh. In January, Armenia refused to conduct CSTO exercises on its territory.