Sergey Lavrov distorts the chronology of Armenia’s appeal to the CSTO

Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov, during his press conference on January 14, once again touched upon the Armenian-Azerbaijani border issue and made a number of untrue statements.

He particularly said: “The CSTO is functioning and working. Back in the fall of 2022, we agreed upon sending a CSTO observation mission to Armenia. That mission was ready to play a deterrent role on the border. However, at that time our Armenian partners said that… the agreement had already been reached, but the Armenian partners refused at the last moment, saying that it was difficult for them to agree, taking into account the fact that during the three-day Armenian-Azerbaijani border incident in 2022, the CSTO did not protect the territory of an allied country.”

Sergey Lavrov misrepresents the chronology: what and how it actually happened

After the 44-day war in 2020, in May 2021, Azerbaijan invaded the border areas of Syunik for the first time under the pretext of carrying out “border adjustment.” Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan described the situation as explosive at the Security Council meeting convened after those events.

And it was exactly then that official Yerevan first appealed to the CSTO to launch the mechanism of initiating emergency consultations within the framework of Article 2 of the Collective Security Treaty of May 15, 1992, in order to coordinate the positions of the CSTO member states and take measures to eliminate the emerging threat.

“Our opinion is unequivocal: the current situation fully complies with Article 2, Paragraph 2 of the Collective Security Treaty, according to which, I quote, “in case of menace to safety, stability, territorial integrity and sovereignty of one or several Member States or menace to international peace and safety, the Member States shall immediately launch the mechanism of joint consultations for the purpose of their positions coordination, develop and take measures for assistance to such Member States for the purpose of elimination of the arisen menace,” Pashinyan stated at the Security Council session.

However, Armenia’s appeal remained unanswered, and at that time, CSTO Secretary General Stanislav Zas qualified the escalation of the situation on the Armenian border as a “border incident” and, furthermore, stated that the situation did not comply with the provisions of the CSTO Collective Security Charter. “It should be understood that the CSTO potential is used only in the event of an attack (on one of the member states). Here we are dealing, in fact, with a border incident. Thank God, there are no casualties, there is no shooting there. This is a border incident, it must be resolved, and we are in favor of resolving it peacefully,” he noted.

For the second time, Armenia officially appealed to the CSTO in the fall of 2022

In the early morning of September 13, Azerbaijani armed forces launched a large-scale attack on the sovereign territory of Armenia and invaded part of it. On September 13, a meeting of the Security Council was convened, during which a decision was made to officially appeal to the CSTO with respect to the aggression against the sovereign territory of the Republic of Armenia. This time, the CSTO did not respond to Armenia’s official application, contenting itself with only a statement.

Nevertheless, Azerbaijani troops continue to illegally remain in the sovereign territory of Armenia.

After all this, in March 2024, in an interview to the Greek periodical Ekathimerini, Nikol Pashinyan stated that in 2021-2022 the CSTO did not fulfilled its security commitments with respect to the Republic of Armenia.

“The practical result (of this CSTO policy) is that we have effectively frozen our participation in the Organization. As of September 2023, we do not have a permanent representative in the CSTO and do not participate in CSTO negotiations at the high and highest levels. However, we do not block CSTO decisions, but do not participate in them,” Pashinyan said.

Lavrov, making reference to Putin, says there is no Armenian-Azerbaijani border

Sergey Lavrov, making reference to Russian President Vladimir Putin, noted at the same press conference: “President Putin has stated more than once that there was no demarcated and delimitated border. Never. 2-3 km from here and there…yes, there was a skirmish then…But to refuse the CSTO mission, which I think would have worked very effectively, was a sovereign decision.”

He did not fail to mention the EU mission either. “At the same time, the EU mission was invited to Armenia initially for two months, then, without agreeing with the Azerbaijanis, the Armenian side unilaterally decided to extend the term of the mission to 2 years. Afterwards, Canada joined that mission, which means the presence of NATO. To our knowledge, that group is more engaged in other issues than the interests of Armenia.”

Sergey Lavrov’s statement on not having an Armenian-Azerbaijani border is untrue at least because without borders, Armenia could not sign an agreement with any organization guaranteeing security. The CSTO accepted Armenia into its membership with a very specific idea of ​​Armenia’s borders, therefore the CSTO did not fulfill its commitment to Armenia, and whether Armenia had demarcated borders or not could not have anything to do with it.

As for the activities of the EU mission in Armenia, weeks after the aggression unleashed by Baku, the first EU civilian mission was deployed in Armenia. The decision was made during the quadrilateral meeting held in Prague on October 6, 2022. Only after this decision, on October 12, 2022, did Russian Foreign Minister Lavrov state that the CSTO was ready to send observers to Armenia and that it was necessary for Armenia to convene an extraordinary session of the CSTO Council. From October 20, 40 European civilian observers were deployed in Armenia for two months, ending their activities on December 19.

Despite this fact, in November of the same year, a meeting of the heads of the CSTO countries was held in Yerevan, during which the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan did not sign the CSTO assistance document, noting that it did not provide a political qualification to the Azerbaijani aggression and did not record the occupation of the sovereign territories of the Republic of Armenia. The second EU mission was deployed from February 2023 for a period of 2 years.

By the way, at the same press conference, Sergey Lavrov also misrepresented the date of the signing of the Charter on Strategic Partnership between Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan and US Secretary of State Anthony Blinken: at the time of his press conference, on the morning of January 14, he said that the document had already been signed, while in fact it was signed many hours after his press conference, on the night of January 14.

Thus, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov distorts the chronology of Armenia’s appeal to the CSTO following Azerbaijani aggression, misrepresents the situation, and as an excuse for CSTO’s inaction, implies that the Armenian-Azerbaijani border does not exist.

Hasmik Hambardzumyan