“Armenian president Serzh Sargsyan’s decision to join the Customs Union instead of signing a Free and Comprehensive Free Trade Agreement with the European Union is a step back on the way to integration with Europe, and it is also a step back in Armenia’s modernization and development,” says Amanda Paul, expert of the European Policy Centre (EPC) in Brussels. The EPC is a research center that is involved in European integration issues.
Yesterday the members of the “Say no to gender perversion” initiative organized a protest in Yerevan. They marched to the government building and submitted a letter to the government. This initiative is against the newly elaborated bill on the equality of men and women, which caused so much noise.
Probably the reason is the American government’s partial shutdown. As a result of this, a number of projects have been delayed or cancelled. In foreign policy they delayed actions according to priority sequence. I am not sure if this was the real reason.
Growing emigration is becoming a threat for Armenia. If this trend continues this way, it may become a threat to Armenia’s national security. The issue of emigration is like an alien for the Armenian society – everybody knows about the growing trends, people feel the impact, but nobody knows real numbers.
“Such announcements downgrade the opposition and create weak image for them,” says Armenian National Congress party representative Arman Grigoryan concerning Zarouhi Postanjyan’s question to president Sargsyan whether he has lost money in European casinos.
Yesterday it was revealed that the European Commission had decided to annul all the restrictions for the import of Moldovan wine. This was the response of the EU to Russia, which ceased the import of Moldovan wine on September 11. This is also a response to Armenia’s claims that in the event if Armenia refused to join the Eurasian Union Russia would block the import of Armenia’s goods.
Many state officials and primarily the Prime-Minister, are paying much attention to reports of renown international organizations and to their best to make sure Armenia is advanced in their rating lists.
Our interviewee is the chair of the Businessmen and Producer Union of Armenia Arsen Ghazaryan
During yesterday’s parliamentary session deputies were trying to understand how it could happen that Armenia was in negotiation with Europe during four years for the purpose of signing association agreement, and just two months before that drastically made a political decision to join Customs Union proposed by Russia and other post-Soviet states.
In a session following parliamentary sitting yesterday Alexander Arzumanyan, former foreign minister, said that the society has not been able to get along with the news concerning joining Customs Union, we see some new integration.
