Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova commented today, July 17, at a briefing on the statement by European Council President António Costa and European Commission President Ursula von der Leyen on their intention to invest at least €2.5 billion in Armenia.

According to her, “apparently, we are talking about money that Brussels has repeatedly promised to provide.”

"They have repeatedly promised this money to Yerevan, to the Armenian people, and to what extent this promise is being fulfilled, I think you should ask in Yerevan whether they have received this money or not.

We are not going to look into their pockets.

This is their relationship with the European institutions. But it seems to me that even from today's briefing, it is obvious that this is a classic tactic of the European Commission, the EU, and NATO: to make generous promises and then, under the guise of these financial incentives, to enslave and continue to control the processes, skimming the cream off the top and benefiting only themselves. Not only that, but they count the same amounts as new aid several times. You see, here Kaja Kallas said: “How can this be, if we are paying, but the aid is not counted as ours. This is wrong,” and so on.

That is, even they sometimes reach a peak of outrage over the machinations that are taking place within NATO associations, between NATO countries, which they themselves initiated," Zakharova said.

According to the official representative of the Russian Foreign Ministry,

“These Western stories about financial aid are manipulative, such as promising one amount, giving half as much or nothing at all, saying that conditions do not allow it or that some fundamental postulates or requirements formulated by who knows whom have not been met.”

"This is often done by Brussels with other countries. At the same time, the European Union is diligently and purposefully creating conditions to stimulate the interest of its foreign partners in receiving precisely this EU assistance.

The methods are well known: nuancing the conditions for access to the European Union market, offering supposedly preferential loans. How much has already been said, not just in words, but in books published on this subject. The creation of a pro-Western civil society, fed by EU grants, which has nothing to do with democracy, but is simply a group of grant recipients or grant eaters. Financial and economic assistance has long ceased to be aid or a desire to develop or stimulate development for the European Union, but rather a lever of influence on the policies of third countries, both in foreign and domestic affairs, and, in fact, interference in internal affairs. We are convinced that assistance for the socio-economic development of third countries or for particularly important infrastructure projects must be provided on completely different, alternative grounds. It is necessary to respect sovereignty, to honor identity, and to treat with respect the foreign policy and economic interests of the countries they intend to help. And, of course, such assistance, as they call it, should not become a tool for harming other countries, artificially introducing instability into regional affairs, or slowing down the development of formats that Brussels is diligently trying to involve, in particular, Yerevan, although not only it, including the European Union's newly minted Black Sea Strategy, which, unfortunately, is aimed precisely at the above," Maria Zakharova said.