One of the tycoons, Gagik Tsarukian, on Wednesday penned a rare op-ed article for Tert.am to warn of severe economic consequences of leaving the Eurasian Economic (EEU).
“One wrong step can literally impoverish millions of people,” Tsarukian wrote. “I'm not scaring you, I'm telling you the truth. I want every citizen to try to imagine this prospect. This means lost jobs, bankrupt businesses, inability to pay children’s tuition fees, problems with paying off mortgages, paying for medical treatment and heating homes, and inability to go on vacation in the summer.
“This means that our agricultural products will no longer be sold on the EEU market, that gas and electricity prices will increase sharply and therefore the prices of all goods will rise too. Our savings will decrease. We saw all this in the 1990s. We overcame it with difficulty and over many years. Do we want to go back now?”
Russia’s Deputy Prime Minister Alexei Overchuk issued a similar warning on January 9 hours after Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s cabinet approved a bill on the “start of a process of Armenia's accession to the European Union.” Overchuk said that Armenia risks losing its tariff-free access to the Russian, guaranteed by its membership in the EEU, and having to pay much more for Russian energy resources and food.
Armenian Economy Minister Gevorg Papoyan said on Monday that Yerevan has no plans yet to leave the EEU. Finance Minister Vahe Hovannisian did not rule out such an exit, though.
Overchuk countered on Wednesday that the authorities in Yerevan “understand perfectly well that joining the European Union is a very hypothetical thing and certainly do not want to lose the economic benefits and advantages that they have as a member state of the EEU.” He reiterated that the bill approved by Pashinian’s cabinet is viewed by Moscow as the “beginning of Armenia’s withdrawal from the EEU.”
Armenia - Billionaire Samvel Karapetian takes part in a Christmas Mass at the Armenian Apostolic Church's main cathedral in Echmiadzin, 6Jan2015.
Such a prospect also prompted concern from Samvel Karapetian, a Russian-Armenian billionaire with extensive business interests in Armenia. He said on Tuesday that Yerevan must not “put political ambitions above economic interests.”
“We can see examples of the consequences of such an approach in the situation in Georgia where political decisions have negatively affected the stability of the country,” Karapetian said.
Meanwhile, Pashinian said on Wednesday that Russian-Armenian relations are now “more practical than ever before.”
“We aim to develop these relations based on mutually beneficial cooperation and sovereignty,” he wrote on Facebook.
The Armenian premier said nothing about his country’s heavy economic dependence on Russia which seems to have deepened further in recent years.
According to Armenian government data, Russia accounted for over 41 percent of Armenia’s foreign trade in January-November 2024, compared with the EU’s 7.5 percent share in the total. Russia is also Armenia’s principal supplier of natural gas and nuclear fuel. Armenia pays the Gazprom giant $165 per thousand cubic meters of Russian gas used by not only power plants and households but also the vast majority of car owners in the country. Wholesale gas prices in the EU are currently three times higher than that.