I once made a statement that initially caused some misunderstanding in Armenia. I said that independence is replacing dependence on the few with dependence on the many, and we are just implementing that policy. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said this in an interview with Radio France Internationale (RFI), answering a question about Armenia-Russia relations.

“Our [i.e. Armenia’s] policy is the following: we want to strengthen, consolidate and develop our independence. And that is why we have adopted a balanced and balancing foreign policy.

We want our people to also have an alternative, we want our tomato producer to also have an alternative, we want our beverage producer to also have an alternative. In general, we want all our economic entities to have alternatives in both export and import sector. And this is also a very important economic task for us,” Pashinyan said.

“I want to give you an example. For example, in the past, the import market for gasoline and oil products in Armenia was very concentrated, and every time we had big problems due to changes in the external environment. In recent years, not a few, but dozens of companies have started importing oil products to Armenia. And this situation has enabled us to also handle the crises related to oil products on the world market more smoothly than other countries do that.

And let me say more: for example, problems arose in Russia in connection with Ukraine’s actions regarding oil products. And thanks to this policy, the Republic of Armenia did not experience those problems, although our task is not that we want Russia to have problems in connection with gasoline and oil products, we want us to have no problems or to have the opportunity to manage our problems,” the Armenian prime minister noted.