If necessary, we will leave the CSTO. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who is on vacation and heads the ruling Civil Contract party’s electoral list for Sunday’s parliamentary election, announced this during the pre-election debate on Public Television, in response to a question from Narek Karapetyan, who heads the electoral list of the Strong Armenia bloc.

"We [i.e. Armenia] will decide, foreign agents will not decide what to do. We will not allow [Belarusian President Alexander] Lukashenko to become our guarantor again," Pashinyan noted. "What does it mean that you have frozen membership in the CSTO? If it doesn't work, get out," Karapetyan said, calling for first obtaining guarantors between Armenia and Azerbaijan.

"Well, then we will leave the CSTO. Are you scaring us? Neither you decide, nor your uncle [i.e. the Strong Armenia bloc’s prime ministerial candidate—businessman and philanthropist—Samvel Karapetyan]. We will decide and we will come out. And the guarantor is Armenia, the state, the army," Pashinyan responded.