Armenia Customs Union cooperation format in discussion, PM says

YEREVAN, May 16. /ARKA/. Different format of cooperation between Armenia and Customs Union is currently in the active phase of the discussion, according to the article written by Armenian Prime Minister Tigran Sargsyan in Russian Vedomosti newspaper.

“We have always supported the process of deepening economic ties within CIS and EurAsEC. At the same time our membership to the Customs Union is inappropriate, as we have common borders neither with Russia and Kazakhstan nor Belarus. However, on the platform of this union we can have some other mutually beneficial forms of cooperation. We need stimuli for integration: there is a so-called experience of “ remote areas”, when the latter cooperate with the union under softer conditions, and receive definite benefits and subsidies. We have proposed to design a special format of cooperation between Armenia and Customs Union, which is in the phase of active discussion,” Sargsyan clarified. 

Armenian PM thinks that integration is a long-lasting process that is based on economic stimuli and compromises.

He also said the country’s economy can fully function if it expands its economic geographical cooperation, and integration processes in the framework of CIS, EurAsEC, and now European Union are mutually complementary. 

“Thus, there can’t be any inconsistency in the fact that Armenia launches negotiations with the EU while staying committed to integration within the former USSR,” he said.

The head of Armenian government added that CIS had undergone through the tense period casting doubt on the future perspectives. 

“Nevertheless, the agreement on free trade area within the CIS, signed last year in St. Petersburg and ratified recently by Russia, confirmed the real necessity of processing further integration,” Sargsyan said. 

According to him, the agreement authorizes setting better conditions for selling goods in a single economic space, reducing the tariffs on import and export or not charging at all, launching single license regulations. It also includes precise and even austere subsidizing rules meeting world standards. 

“On the other hand, new forms of cooperation establish fair principles among CIS state members. No one will allow another county to abuse the regulations within the single economic space,” Sargsyan said adding that due to different levels of social-economic development of the counties it will be hard to reach the parity, and it will be the main challenge for all those interested in the integration. 

These issues can be solved if the states are committed to rational co-existence in the fast changing modern world, where the processes of economic standardization should be accelerated too.

“Single, and comprehensive for everybody, rules will allow to save milliards spent on transaction fees, increase trade and provide the consumers with secure and high-level goods and services,” Sargsyan highlighted.

Armenian PM also clarified that the configuration of the global markets is constantly changing nowadays. 

“In this context we should construct new formats of relations that would set favorable conditions for household subjects,” he said adding that while thinking about future Armenia should modernize institutions serving to form convenient infrastructure for the further integration. 

“First of all we should introduce single standards and strictly control the other members to follow the established regulations,” the Prime Minister said.

According to him, it is important to make joint steps towards assisting the states that stayed behind in their development unleashing their potential for the economic growth.

Integration should be benefited by all state, otherwise integration just for integration makes no sense, he concluded. -0-