Georgia’s sole border crossing with Russia heavily used by Armenian exporters is not at risk of closure following renewed tensions between Moscow and Tbilisi, Georgian Deputy Prime Minister Maya Tskitishvili insisted on Thursday.
Moscow temporarily banned passenger flights between Russia and Georgia last week after violent protests in Tbilisi sparked by the visit of a Russian lawmaker. Some Russian pro-government politicians and commentators have called on the Kremlin to impose harsher sanctions on Georgia. A Russian government watchdog issued on Monday what was widely construed as a veiled threat to ban imports of Georgian wine.
This raised fears in Armenia that Moscow could also shut down the Russian-Georgian border crossing at Upper Lars. Most of Armenia’s trade with Russia, which reached nearly $2 billion last year, is carried out through that mountainous route.
Tskitishvili, who is also Georgia’s minister for regional development and infrastructure, said she does not expect any problems at Upper Lars because “there is no tension in economic relations” between her country and Russia.
“I can’t understand why such a question is raised in the first place,” she told reporters during a visit to Yerevan. “There are certainly no problems for representatives of any country [using Upper Lars,] including Armenian businesspeople, because we are doing everything we can to further economic ties between Georgia and Armenia.”
Tskitishvili argued that Moscow and Tbilisi, which fought a brief war in 2008, restored bilateral commercial ties in 2012 despite having no diplomatic relations. “We seek to develop transport corridors,” she went on. “It is therefore not desirable to have any tension that could affect economic ties.”
Speaking at a cabinet meeting held earlier in the day, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian thanked the Russian and Georgian governments for ensuring “the normal functioning of Armenia’s export routes.”
Tskitishvili spoke after a two-day session of a Georgian-Armenian intergovernmental commission economic cooperation which discussed ways of expanding trade and investments between the two neighboring states.
According to official Armenian statistics, Georgian-Armenia trade rose by 14 percent but still stood at a modest $43.4 million in the first four months of this year.
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