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

Turkey is successfully managing to implement a strategic balancing act in its relations with the US and Russia. Other regional actors may look at this policy and take good note.
Since the summer 2016 Turkish foreign policy has been facing a tough challenge: how to balance its growing partnership with Russia with its relations with the US? The rising tensions between the US and Russia, as well as the widening gap between the US and Turkish interests in Syria, the refusal by Washington to extradite cleric Fetullah Gulen, and simmering doubts among the Turkish leadership regarding the possible involvement of the US in the 2016 July military coup attempt, make this task even more daunting. READ MORE

• September 16, 2019

Joint Study with “Yeni nesil”, coordinated by Boris Navasardian, President, Yerevan Press Club

The main purpose of this study was to consider the feasibility and prospects of revival of the Track-2 diplomacy and the development of appropriate recommendations. Although it was conceived and supported by the US government even before the political changes in Armenia, its relevance was confirmed by the intensification of the dialogue at the official level between Yerevan and Baku in the summer of 2018. Certain characteristics of the renewed interest in the informal communication were revealed during the visit to Yerevan of the Azerbaijani journalist Shahin Hajiyev, in February 2019, and by the interest of Armenian journalists to visit the neighboring country. READ MORE

• September 16, 2019

OPEC agreed on Thursday to trim oil output by asking over-producing members Iraq and Nigeria to bring production in line with their targets as the group strives to prevent a glut amid soaring U.S. production and a slowing global economy.

• September 13, 2019

Russia condemned Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu’s plan to annex the Jordan Valley ahead of a meeting between the Israeli leader and President Vladimir Putin later on Thursday, warning it could sharply increase regional tensions.

• September 13, 2019

The World Trade Organization (WTO) Appellate Body largely backed Russia on Thursday in ruling that Ukraine’s anti-dumping duties on ammonium nitrate from Russia violated WTO rules.

• September 13, 2019

Russian Energy Minister Alexander Novak said on Wednesday that he and Saudi Arabia’s new energy minister agreed that all parties should implement the global oil output deal between OPEC and its allies, Interfax news agency reported.

• September 11, 2019

The European Union will do all it can to facilitate talks next week between Ukraine and Russia on future gas transits after their contract expires in January, the bloc’s energy commissioner said on Wednesday.

• September 11, 2019

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

South Caucasus is a part of EU’s Eastern Partnership program. Launched in 2009, the Eastern Partnership envisages fostering relations between the EU and six former Soviet Union republics – Armenia, Azerbaijan, Belarus, Georgia, Moldova and Ukraine. The key goal of this program is the signature of Association and Deep and Comprehensive Free Trade Area agreements to bring about political association and economic integration. The top priority for the EU has been the political and economic development of the region, as Brussels did not want to have a permanent source of instability in its immediate neighborhood. READ MORE

• September 9, 2019