Despite stern warnings from the Russian leadership, the Armenian parliament ratified on October 3 the founding treaty of the International Criminal Court (ICC) known as the Rome Statute. The move initiated by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian and condemned by Moscow added to unprecedented tensions between the two allied states.
Russian officials said it will cause serious damage to Russian-Armenian relations. They dismissed Yerevan’s assurances that the ratification does not commit it to arresting Putin and handing him over to the ICC in the event of his visit to Armenia.
Putin said that he and Pashinian have exchanged fresh invitations to visit their respective capitals. He said he has no plans to travel to Yerevan yet because Pashinian is now busy coping with “the tragedy of Nagorno-Karabakh’s Armenians.”
“He probably has no time for traveling right now,” Putin told reporters after a Commonwealth of Independent States summit in Kyrgyzstan’s capital Bishkek. “When the situation [in Armenia] normalizes I will visit them and [Pashinian] will come [to Moscow.]”
Putin stressed that he and Pashinian “remain in touch” and that their governments keep working together on their bilateral agenda. He went on to play down Pashinian’s decision not to attend the CIS summit, attributing it to “quite understandable circumstances.”
“I’m not going to talk about them. You had better ask the Armenian prime minister. As far as I understand, Armenia is not leaving the CIS,” added the Russian leader.
Pashinian made clear earlier this week that he does not plan to demand the withdrawal of Russian troops from Armenia or get his country out of the Russian-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) repeatedly criticized by him. Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov seemed encouraged by these assurances.
“We hope that this position will prevail despite [Western] attempts to drag Yerevan in another direction,” Lavrov told journalists in Bishkek on Thursday.
For his part, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov expressed confidence on Friday that Armenia will remain Russia’s ally.