‘Secret” of Sargsyan-Putin meeting (video)
In the near future Russia will try to transfer the confrontation with Turkey to the Black Sea and it [Russia] needs Armenia’s support. Political expert Stepan Safaryan considers today’s meeting between Serzh Sargsyan and Vladimir Putin in this context. “It considers Armenia’s participation and Armenia’s territory as an arena of military operations, which is unacceptable and disturbing.” Recently information about the weapons and the location of the military units of Armenia and Nagorno-Karabakh has been published in the Russian military weekly. Stepan Safaryan notes, “It was message that warns us that we are weaker than Azerbaijan and that we must agree with the proposal, which must be put forward in Moscow. It says that the most important problem is Turkey and suggests handling the issues of Turkey together.” Yet, political expert Sergey Minasyan isn’t concerned about the report published by the weekly. “99 percent of that data was taken in different ways from open sources and, by the way, I must say, those numbers are several times lower, than the military potential Nagorno-Karabakh DA or the RA Armed forces have.” Political expert doesn’t think that anything will change in the NK issue after the meeting of Serzh Sargsyan and Vladimir Putin. “If there are any changes, only in the issues, which are connected with the mechanisms of decreasing tension at the borders.” This week he participated in the closed discussion held in Tbilisi with the participation of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs and Armenian and Azerbaijani expert circles. “Only issues relating to Madrid principles and possible implementation were discussed. It had consultative importance from the point of view of the Minsk Group Co-Chairs, who always need new ideas.” He got the impression that Azerbaijan has begun to understand that escalating the situation over Nagorno-Karabakh not only hinders the process of peaceful negotiations but also makes the Armenian side strengthen its stance.
