An Armenian government statement said Pashinian and Colonel-General Sergei Istrakov, the deputy chief of the Russian military’s General Staff, discussed Russian-Armenian “military-technical cooperation,” an official term that often relates to arms supplies.
They also “exchanged thoughts on the current military-political situation in the region,” it added without elaborating.
Photographs released by the government’s press office showed that Defense Minister Arshak Karapetian was also present at the meeting. The Armenian Defense Ministry did not report on Thursday separate talks between Istrakov and Karapetian or other Armenian military officials.
Istrakov already visited Yerevan in January and July this year at the head of Russian military delegations that held “staff negotiations” with the Armenian army’s top brass.
Armenia moved to further deepen its close military ties with Russia shortly after the six-week war in Nagorno-Karabakh stopped by a Russian-brokered ceasefire last November. Moscow has since deployed troops in Armenia’s Syunik province bordering districts southwest of Karabakh retaken by Azerbaijan during and after the hostilities.
Meeting with Karapetian in Moscow in August, Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu said Moscow will continue to help Yerevan reform, rearm and modernize the Armenian armed forces.
“We can consider that the process of arms supplies to Armenia has started,” the Russian defense minister said as he gifted his Armenian counterpart a dagger.
According to the Armenian Defense Ministry, the two ministers reached “a number of important agreements regarding forthcoming cooperation programs.”