YEREVAN. – There is a problem in the Russian elite with what has happened in Armenia. There is mistrust toward those who, before the revolution [in Armenia], worked in the public sector and were funded by international organizations. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said this in an interview with CivilNet.

He assessed his relations with Russian President Vladimir Putin as very well, but said, in general, there are two dimensions of relations.

“There are personal interaction and relations between me and Putin, and there are relations between institutions,” Pashinyan said. “[But] I want to speak very clearly. Yes, there is a problem in the elite of Russia with everything that has happened in Armenia: people’s revolution, and people who came to power through people’s revolution. And who are these people? They are those people who in the past have been political opposition, political activists. And we know that these people, who have had some principles, didn’t want to cooperate with the former authorities. In many cases, these people had to settle in the public sector. In many cases, this public sector was funded by international organizations, as well as by international organizations that are not well perceived in Russia and the former Soviet expanse. Why have these people appeared there? Because they didn’t want to cooperate with the authorities, didn’t want to adopt the game rules of the government, they had principles and wanted to stay within those principles. And they needed a certain field of activity, they were representatives of civil society, and they were dealing with international organizations and, also, were funded by them.”

According to Pashinyan, this is why mistrust has been formed in Russia toward some Armenian officials.

“And I’m convinced that this mistrust will be overcome by time,” the Armenian PM added. “I don’t think there are such issues in Russia regarding me. But as long as those institutions haven’t interacted with each other sufficiently and they haven’t been convinced that they are dealing with the sovereign authorities of a sovereign country, those issues exist, they will rise. I don’t see a tragedy.”