Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian said that he and Russian President Vladimir Putin did not reach an agreement on the price of Russian natural gas imported by Armenia when they met in the Kremlin on Thursday.
“There is no decision on the gas topic and [Russian-Armenian] discussions on gas will continue in a working regime,” Pashinian said in an overnight Facebook transmission aired on his return to Yerevan.
“Of course, it was noted [at the meeting] that this is an extremely sensitive issue for bilateral relations and the governments of both Armenia and Russia are conscious of that sensitivity,” he went on. “But by and large I am optimistic about this topic and hope that there will be desirable developments for us here as well or that least there won’t be undesirable developments.”
Since 2016 Armenia has paid $150 per thousand cubic meters of Russian gas under a bilateral deal that runs until the end of this month. The Armenian government hoped in the run-up to Thursday’s talks that the Russians will not raise this price, which is set well below the cost of Russian gas supplied to European Union member states.
Putin’s press secretary, Dmitry Peskov, told reporters on Friday that Putin and Pashinian agreed to “intensify” talks on the new gas price. “Unfortunately, until yesterday we could not note active negotiations between our Gazprom and Armenian colleagues,” he said, according to the TASS news agency.
Peskov also made clear that the talks cannot last long because “we are in time trouble.”
Gazprom announced, meanwhile, that its chief executive, Alexei Miller, met with Armenian Deputy Mher Grigorian in Saint Petersburg on Friday. A statement by the Russian gas monopoly said they discussed gas supplies to Armenia in 2019 but did not give any details.
Putin and Pashinian also discussed the thorny issue of who should be the new secretary general of the Russian-led Collective Security Organization (CSTO). The vacant post was held by a retired Armenian army general, Yuri Khachaturov, until last month.
Khachaturov was sacked after being controversially charged by Armenian authorities in connection with the 2008 post-election violence in Yerevan. Moscow strongly criticized the charges.
Yerevan has been trying to ensure that another representative of Armenia is allowed to complete Khachaturov’s three-year tenure which was due to expire in 2020. However, at least four other CSTO member states -- Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan -- want a Belarusian nominee, Stanislav Zas, to become the next secretary general.
Pashinian said he and Putin had a “brief discussion on the situation in the CSTO” but did not clarify whether they reached any understandings on who should run the defense alliance. Instead, he stressed the need for amendments to the CSTO statutes that would prevent “such disputes” in the future.
The Armenian leader also noted a “very positive atmosphere” in his meeting with Putin. “I can conclude that we have a full understanding on the strategic direction of development of relations between our countries,” he said, adding that they did not discuss the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict.
Putin began the meeting by congratulating Pashinian on his My Step alliance’s “convincing victory” in the December 9 parliamentary elections. The Russian president has still not congratulated Pashinian in writing, fuelling Armenian media speculation about his discontent with the new authorities in Yerevan.
In his opening remarks publicized by the Kremlin, Putin also praised the “truly allied relations” between the two nations and growing trade between them. “I think that the dynamic is good,” he said. “It must be maintained.”
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