We need both the EU and the EAEU evenly and equally until we fulfill our commitment to form alternatives, and our people make a choice in favor of one of them, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated at Thursday’s press briefing:

“By the way, there is another choice. We mention two, but there is a third choice. There may be a third initiative, neither the EAEU nor the EU. And who said that everyone is necessarily going somewhere. There may be a third option, too. Of course, I say that what the famous leader of the EAEU [i.e. Belarusian President Alexander Lukashenko] said had such a role, but the problem is not that a politician announced something, and Armenia reacts to it in this way, as is commonly said, overreacts. The problem is not that phenomenon.

The problem is the perception underlying that phenomenon, that in the end should we, dear colleagues, look each other in the eye and say that what the president of Belarus said is the perception of a number of EAEU member states about Armenia, a deep institutional perception, and it is a disrespectful perception? What is that perception based on? That perception was based on the fact that, well, there is the Karabakh conflict, there is the conflict with Azerbaijan, there is the conflict with Turkey, these hostilities are insurmountable, so they have nowhere to run. We can treat them as we want.

So why did this conversation open in an environment of peace and under conditions of peace? When I said [that] the Karabakh issue was a lever, a rope, a noose or a trap—I said the words. Well, what did I mean? This is exactly what I meant.

The people of Armenia did not have a real right to choose, because the people of Armenia were constantly led into traps. Now we want to create alternatives for the people of Armenia, so that the people can choose for themselves. Will they choose the EAEU, then we will be the EAEU, will they choose the EU, we will be the EU, but that choice must be mature,” said the Armenian premier.

He added that today there are already other alternatives, and that in this way it has been proven that Armenia is not a peripheral province, and it is a crossroads with the South Caucasus.