You know that there were no meetings planned in advance at the White House. And I, yes, met with the US vice president on the last day of my visit, and that was the last event—and spontaneous. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated this in the National Assembly of Armenia Wednesday—and in response to ruling majority faction MP Sona Ghazaryan’s question about what impressions he returned from the US with.

“I had gone there to participate in the National Prayer Breakfast and the [International] Religious Freedom Summit [in Washington, D.C.] Such an idea arose spontaneously during the meeting and the meeting was organized, so to speak, in an unplanned manner. The meeting lasted quite a long time, took place in a 1+3 format, it was not a tête-à-tête conversation. The members of the delegation included Armenia’s ambassador to the US, the head of the foreign relations department of the government staff, and my spokesperson.

A thorough and detailed conversation took place. Moreover, it took place in a mixed environment for them, and we highly appreciate the invitation to that meeting under those conditions. Both parties have formed an interest in holding such a meeting, and I consider that meeting very important and very productive,” Pashinyan said.

He noted that the document on Armenian-American strategic cooperation was signed during a transition period.

“As they call it, transition teams are formed during that transition period. The subtlety is that the new [US] administration participated in the signing of this document as much as the previous administration participated because if the new administration did not want to, the previous administration would not have signed it; that is their political culture.

We must treat all this as work. We treat everything either with the logic of the apocalypse or manna falling from heaven. This is work, and it should be everyday for us.

It is normal for the prime minister of Armenia to meet with the vice president, the president of the United States. But to turn every meeting into either a legally binding verdict of conviction or acquittal, not subject to appeal, is not the right approach. Both are an expression of a complex,” the Armenian PM said.

Pashinyan noted that there is a certain dynamic in Armenian-American relations, and that this dynamic must be maintained and developed.