EEU leaders adopt development declaration until 2045

YEREVAN, December 26. /ARKA/. The leaders of the five former Soviet republics, which make up the Eurasian Economic Union (EEU), approved Monday in Russian St. Petersburg a declaration laying out a path for the group’s development until 2045, Russian Tass news agency reported.

Russian President Vladimir Putin was quoted as saying that ‘this new document of program nature provides for specific measures to intensify joint efforts in key sectors, as well as identifies additional areas of cooperation, such as the climate agenda, medicine, tourism and some others."

A free trade agreement between the EEU and Iran was signed on the sidelines of the meeting. The EEU comprises Armenia, Belarus, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Russia.

Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov told reporters that Russian President Vladimir Putin and Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan will have an opportunity to talk on the sidelines of the meetings of the leaders of the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS) and Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU) in St. Petersburg.

Pashinyan travelled on Monday to St. Petersburg to attend a meeting of the Eurasian Economic Council and an informal meeting of CIS heads. Armenia will be holding the rotating chairmanship in the EEU from January 1, 2024.

Armenian prime minister and other top officials have been refusing to attend Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and CIS events for a year. Pashinyan skipped the latest CSTO summit in Minsk in November, expressing hope "that the CSTO partners will take this decision with understanding." Pashinyan failed also to attend a meeting of CIS heads of state and government in Bishkek in October. -0-