Deputy Foreign Minister Vahan Kostanian briefly spoke with Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskyy and Foreign Minister Andrii Sybiha during an official ceremony to mark the 975th anniversary of the establishment of Ukraine’s oldest Christian monastery, the Kyiv-Pechersk Lavra.
According to the Armenian Foreign Ministry, they praised the “recently intensified high-level political contacts” between the two states and agreed on the need to continue them “in order to enrich the Armenia-Ukraine bilateral agenda and further strengthen relations.” The ministry released similar readouts of Kostanian’s talks with Ukraine’s Deputy Foreign Minister Oleksandr Mischenko and two senior Ukrainian lawmakers.
Kostanian arrived in Kyiv two days after Zelenskyy’s phone call with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian. Sybiha likewise spoke with his Armenian counterpart Ararat Mirzoyan last week.
Zelenskyy said after the call that he discussed with Pashinian, among other things, the “results” of his May visit to Yerevan that sparked a furious reaction from Russia. Speaking during a European summit held in the Armenian capital, the Ukrainian leader implicitly threated to disrupt Russia’s upcoming Victory Day parade in Moscow with drone strikes.
The Russian Foreign Ministry condemned the “terrorist” threats and Pashinian’s failure to respond to them. Pashinian rejected the criticism echoed by senior Russian lawmakers.
Russian-Armenian tensions have risen further since then, with Moscow banning key imports from Armenia and pressuring Yerevan to quickly choose between remaining part of a Russian-led trade bloc and seeking to join the European Union. Earlier this month, a Russian Foreign Ministry spokesman deplored Yerevan’s “demonstrative flirtations with the Kyiv regime” and questioned its readiness for a “truly allied cooperation with Russia.”