Eurasian project for Armenia: view from Yerevan. Part 1

Susanna Petrosian, Yerevan, exclusively to Vestnik Kavkaza

In late January Yerevan hosted several events aimed at developing the information space of the Eurasian project. The organizers of the program, including the opening of the school of journalistic skills, presentation of the Center for Political Studies "North-South", a round table "Eurasian humanitarian and information space - new windows of opportunities" and a video conference between Yerevan and Moscow on the Eurasian project for the South Caucasus, were the Center "North -South" and RIA Novosti.

"Over the last two years we see the clearly defined task of the Russian leadership: building new lines of communication, not only in areas of the economy, security, addressing issues related to mutual trade, but also in a broader humanitarian sense. The main tools of informational, humanitarian and socio-cultural communications are not only our humanitarian holdings - "Russian World" and "Rossotrudnichestvo"; no less important a role is played by the non-governmental sector," the executive director of the Center "North-South", editor-in-chief of VK Alexei Vlasov said at the opening of the School. He noted that representatives of the media should become kinds of communicators in the dialogue that must exist not only through top government officials of Russia and Armenia, but, first and foremost, in their civil societies.

Addressing the theme of the Eurasian project, Vlasov was right to note that in Yerevan there is a lack of information about why Armenia needs the Eurasian project, what the interest of the Armenian state in terms of interaction not only with Russia but multilaterally is, because Eurasian integration modules, the Customs Union (TC) and the Common Economic Space also include Kazakhstan and Belarus, with which Armenia does not have such close relations as with Russia.

Yerevan's position
In Armenia, both at the management level and at the level of experts, and in society as a whole, there is a certain amount of distrust of and pessimism about the Eurasian economic project. Another thing is security issues - in this area there is a full understanding of the role of Russia as well as the role of the CSTO in the security of Armenia.

"It is not clear what else Russia wants, given the existence of the CIS, the Collective Security Treaty Organization and the Customs Union", political scientist Igor Muradian says. The Eurasian Union (EAU) is perceived as some part of the electoral slogan of President Putin. And the politicians and experts who point to the need for Armenia's accession to the Customs Union and the EAC have not given a comprehensive explanation of it and have limited themselves to appeals and slogans. "Creating the EAC is the call of the times, for only by combining the resources and capabilities of the CIS can we be competitive and face the challenges of the millennium. It is impossible to delay the creation of the Eurasian Union," the head of the Democratic Party of Armenia, Aram Sargsyan, says. Even less specific thoughts were expressed by another supporter of the EAC - political analyst Sergei Shakaryants, who believes that the creation of the Eurasian Union is aimed not at 5 or 20 years, but it is an eternal single space, which should give a new impetus to the development of the entire Eurasian continent.

Ideology
Armenia and Russia have serious economic ties, but ideology, or rather its absence, is a key problem for the perception of the idea of EAU. "On what ideology will we build the Eurasian integration project? This question is number one. The absence of these common values creates certain tension. We do not fully understand each other either at the level of civil society or at the level of political elites," Vlasov says.

It is a mistake to assume that the intention of Armenia to work closely with the European Union is due only to economic interests. The EU is a particularly civilizational alliance, including a union of Christian peoples. While the economies of most of the EU countries are considered liberal and competitive, in fact the idea of the EU is, ironically, a socialist idea and aims to align the level of development and life of those who live in this area. Incorporating ideas have also always been present in the FSU.

In the ideology of imperial Russia the Orthodox element has always occupied a special place. In addition, not always and not all territories were annexed to the Russian Empire by force. Tsarist Russia supported the Christian nations living on the periphery and the Muslim people, who for whatever reason did not want to be part of the neighboring Islamic empires, in particular, the Persian Empire and the Ottoman Empire. It was quite an interesting state with no direct division into nations, but it was said that the Tsar has good and bad subjects. At the heart of the Soviet Union there is the ideology of communism. Of course, this is not the best idea, but still it has become unifying and managed to unite all the peoples of the former USSR, which in any case somehow agreed to build communism.

In the case of the EAC there is no such idea. There are some works of Russian scientists, which, however, are mostly geopolitical, but the philosophy of the project still remains unclear. The problems associated with today's Russia are added to this uncertainty.