By Benyamin Poghosyan, PhD, Executive Director, Political Science Association of Armenia

In 2019, the EU and six Partner states are celebrating the 10th anniversary of the Eastern Partnership (EaP) program. Many conferences, expert workshops and other events were organized to assess the success and failures of the EaP. Meanwhile, alongside assessments of the past, the future of the program is also being actively discussed. EU even launched the ‘Structured Consultation” on the future strategic direction of the EaP and tasked the European Commission and the European External Action Service to present proposals. Member States and Eastern Partners, as well as other actors, including civil society, academia and think-tanks were invited to share their views on a new post-2020 policy framework, and the perspectives of EU enlargement. READ MORE

• December 16, 2019

Russia and Belarus have come closer to resolving their differences on oil and gas supplies, Russia’s economy minister said on Saturday after talks between the two countries.

• December 11, 2019

The U.S. Senate Foreign Relations Committee will vote as soon as next week on legislation that would impose stiff new sanctions on Russia over its meddling in U.S. elections and aggression against Ukraine, a committee spokeswoman said on Wednesday.

• December 11, 2019

By Benyamin Poghosyan, PhD, Executive Director, Political Science Association of Armenia

On December 4, 2019, Armenian and Azerbaijani foreign ministers held their last meeting for this year on the margins of the OSCE Ministerial Conference in Bratislava. According to Armenian and Azerbaijani sources, the current stage of negotiations, the necessity of ceasefire consolidation and the implementation of confidence-building measures were among the key topics of discussion. The Foreign Minister of Armenia highlighted the modest achievement reached within the framework of the agreement on preparing the populations for peace, through the implementation of an exchange program for media representatives from Armenia, Artsakh and Azerbaijan. READ MORE

• December 10, 2019

By Benyamin Poghosyan, PhD, Executive Director, Political Science Association of Armenia

The South Caucasus always has quite complicated geopolitics. Russia, the US, the EU, Iran, Turkey, and China all have interests here. Armenia, Azerbaijan, and Georgia have different domestic political structures and cultures. Besides that, their national security threat perception and foreign policy goals do not coincide with each other. The protracted conflicts in Nagorno Karabakh, Abkhazia, and South Ossetia make the regional geopolitics even more complicated. All actors involved in the South Caucasus seek to exploit these conflicts to pursue their national interests; meanwhile, conflicting parties themselves have an absolutely different understanding on how these conflicts may be resolved. READ MORE

• December 4, 2019

Ukrainian state energy company Naftogaz said on Friday that there was still a long way to go before an agreement is reached with Russia on a new gas deal.

• December 2, 2019

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskiy may discuss problems in negotiating a new natural gas deal when they meet other European leaders in Paris on Dec. 9, a Kremlin spokesman said on Friday.

• December 2, 2019

Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Chinese counterpart Xi Jinping on Monday oversaw the launch of a landmark pipeline that will transport natural gas from Siberia to northeast China, an economic and political boost to ties between Moscow and Beijing.

• December 2, 2019