Zakharova warns Armenia against rapprochement with the West

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YEREVAN, 18 July. /ARKA/. In a comment on the frequent visits of US officials to Armenia, Russian Foreign Ministry spokesperson Maria Zakharova argued that they are creating an illusion that the US cares about the welfare of Armenia and its people./pp ‘In reality, they are dragging the post-Soviet countries into anti-Russian campaigns and plots, and by doing so they are damaging not so much us as these countries , their economies and humanitarian policies,’ she said at a press briefing on Thursday./pp

According to Zakharova, Russia hopes that its partners in the South Caucasus understand ‘what such pseudo-friendship with the West will cost them.’/pp

The spokeswoman believes that the United States considers the South Caucasus solely as a springboard for various kinds of actions against Russia and peaceful coexistence of countries and peoples there./pp ‘They are not satisfied with Russia with its capabilities because it pursues a peace-loving policy, and they are not satisfied with the peace-loving policy itself in principle,’ Zakharova said./pp/pp

She noted that achieving peace and stability in the region, which is possible only with a comprehensive normalisation of relations between the countries with the involvement of Russia, Iran and Turkey, is not part of Washington's goals and objectives./pp ‘They set this as their anti-target. Their task is to make sure that no interaction, no rapprochement and understanding is achieved in the region,’ she said./pp

Yerevan, by deepening cooperation with countries that have declared their goal to strategically defeat Russia, risks to seriously destabilise the situation in the South Caucasus, including to the detriment of its own security, Zakharova said./pp ‘In Armenia, they prefer to increase interaction with NATO - a strange story, of course. They participated in the alliance's summit in Washington, they conduct joint military manoeuvres. A clear example is the US-Armenian exercise Eagle Partner 2024 currently underway on the territory of the country. This causes not only regret, but also concern for Armenia's future, because the United States and the EU have conducted such machinations with many countries many times. You know very well how it ends: they use it and then throw it away,’ she said. -0-/pp/p