“We have information that they are signaling to the Armenians, ‘Come to us, kick the Russians out of your territory, remove the [Russian] military base and border guards too, the Americans will help to ensure your security,” he told the Russian TV channel Tsargrad in an interview broadcast on Wednesday.
Lavrov condemned the alleged Western policy as a “blatant provocation.” The Armenian Foreign Ministry declined to immediately comment on his claims.
Lavrov already decried in March “undisguised attempts by Western countries to estrange Armenia from Russia.” He also renewed Russian allegations that the U.S. and the European Union are seeking to hijack Armenian-Azerbaijani agreements brokered by Moscow during and after the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh.
The traditionally close Russian-Armenian relations have deteriorated significantly since last September due to what Yerevan sees as Moscow’s reluctance to defend it against Azerbaijani military attacks on Armenian territory.
In January, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian went as far as to question the need for close military ties with Russia. Pashinian said that they may be putting Armenia’s security and territorial integrity at greater risk. The Russian Foreign Ministry dismissed the claim as “absurd.”
These lingering tensions have fuelled speculation about a pro-Western shift in Armenia’s geopolitical orientation.
The Russian Foreign Ministry claimed that the West wants to “squeeze Russia out of the region” when it reacted in February to the deployment of 100 or so EU monitors to Armenia’s volatile border with Azerbaijan. The monitoring mission was requested by the Armenian government.
Speaking to Tsargrad, Lavrov again rebuked Yerevan for refusing a similar mission offered by the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) in November.
“If Yerevan had confirmed what had already been agreed [by CSTO member states] … I am convinced that Armenia would have benefited and gotten a more stable situation,” he said.
Pashinian’s government has attributed its refusal to Russia’s and other CSTO allies’ failure to publicly condemn the “Azerbaijani aggression” against Armenia. It has given the same reason for rejecting “military-technical assistance” offered by the Russian-led military alliance last fall.
