“The sides emphasized that [Chinese-Armenian] military cooperation has progressed significantly in recent years, encompassing new directions,” the Armenian Defense Ministry said in a statement. “The ministers expressed readiness to further develop Armenia-China cooperation, including high-level contacts between the armed forces of the two countries.”
The ministry gave no further details of the talks and Papikian’s other engagements in China. The Armenian minister flew to Beijing on Tuesday from South Korea where he attended a summit on the use of artificial intelligence in the military.
Chinese-Armenian military ties appeared to deepen under Armenia’s previous leadership. The two states signed an agreement on “military and military-technical cooperation” in 2012. Papikian’s predecessors visited China in 2011 and 2017. Still, Yerevan has never officially reported or confirmed any acquisitions of Chinese weapons.
Amid its deepening rift with Armenia’s traditional ally Russia, the current Armenian government is keen to diversify the sources of arms supplies to the South Caucasus nation. In the last two years, it has signed a number of multimillion-dollar defense contracts with India, China’s main regional rival. It is not clear whether the Armenian military would also like to buy Chinese weapons.
“We can cooperate on international peacekeeping, humanitarian de-mining, military education, military reforms and technology,” the Chinese military attache in Yerevan, An Qiang, said last year. “These areas of cooperation have great potential for development.”