Raisi’s office singled out the issue in its readout of his meeting with Deputy Prime Minister Mher Grigorian reported by Iranian news agencies. The intervention of “outsiders” in regional disputes could only exacerbate, rather than resolve, them, he said in a clear reference to the United States and the European Union.
Raisi made the same point in a December phone call with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian. In recent years, Pashinian’s government has increasingly pinned its hopes on U.S. and EU efforts to broker an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty.
Russia is very critical of those efforts, saying that they are primarily aimed at driving Moscow out of the region and could only spell more trouble for the Armenians.
“The future of the South Caucasus should be decided by the countries for which this region is a common home. Neither the United States, nor France, nor the European Union are among such countries,” Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin told the Moscow daily Izvestia in an interview published on Thursday.
“Therefore, we believe that the involvement of extra-regional forces, representatives of the West in this region, something towards which official Yerevan is unfortunately inclined, is not useful,” said Galuzin.
Amid Armenia’s unprecedented rift with Russia, Pashinian’s government has pledged to “diversify” the South Caucasus country’s foreign and security policy through closer links with the Western powers. Last September, it hosted a U.S.-Armenian military exercise criticized by both Moscow and Tehran.
Despite his clear warning to Yerevan, Raisi on Thursday described Iran’s current relationship with Armenia as “friendly” and “constructive.” He called for the “full implementation” of economic agreements reached by the two neighboring states.
An Armenian delegation headed Grigorian visited Tehran for a regular session of an Armenian-Iranian intergovernmental commission on economic cooperation.
Iran backs Armenia in its rejection of Azerbaijani demands for an extraterritorial corridor that would connect Azerbaijan to its Nakhichevan exclave through Syunik, the only Armenian region bordering the Islamic Republic. According to an Armenian government statement, during his meeting with Raisi, Grigorian praised Tehran’s stance on “the inviolability of Armenia’s territorial integrity and sovereignty.”
