The Kremlin reported at the weekend that Putin will address a plenary session of the seventh Eastern Economic Forum on Wednesday. He will be joined by Pashinian, Myanmar’s military ruler Min Aung Hlaing, Mongolia’s Prime Minister Luvsannamsrain Oyun-Erdene and China's top legislator Li Zhanshu, it said in a statement.
The three-day event will also feature video addresses by the prime ministers of India and Malaysia, added the statement. It said nothing about the participation of the leaders of other ex-Soviet republics allied to Russia, notably Central Asian countries. Just like Armenia, they have not publicly condemned the Russian invasion of Ukraine, let alone joined Western economic sanctions against Moscow.
The latest Vladivostok forum is titled “On the path to a multipolar world,” reflecting Russia’s efforts to end the global dominance of the United States and other Western powers.
The Kremlin also reported that Putin will hold separate meetings with Pashinian and the other foreign leaders attending the event. An aide to Putin, Yury Ushakov, said the Russian and Armenian leaders will focus on the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. The unresolved conflict was the main theme of four phone calls held by them last month.
Putin spoke with Azerbaijan’s President Ilham Aliyev by phone on Saturday. According to the Kremlin’s readout of the call, Aliyev briefed Putin on his latest meeting with Pashinian hosted by the European Union’s top official, Charles Michel, in Brussels on August 31.
Speaking just hours before the Brussels summit, the Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman, Maria Zakharova, scoffed at the EU’s continuing peace efforts. She said that they are driven by anti-Russian “geopolitical ambitions,” rather than a sincere desire to end the Karabakh conflict.