It is unrealistic to hold a referendum at this time. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said this in an interview with Radio France Internationale (RFI), referring to the claims of Russian officials regarding a need for Armenia holding a referendum on relations with the European Union (EU).
“If you ask me a question, say: ‘Is the Republic of Armenia ready to be a member of the European Union today?’ I will honestly say that no, because we still need to implement many reforms in order to meet those standards; that is, applying in itself already implies a certain level of maturity of the process. Simply applying for the sake of applying is not very logical, especially since we are very actively working with the EU to implement reforms in our country as effectively as possible,” Pashinyan noted.
Also, he said that the objectives were not, are not, and will not be to break or worsen Armenia’s relations with Russia.
"On the contrary, we want to develop our relations with Russia. We simply need to record: regardless of everything, regardless of political leadership, our relations with Russia cannot be the same as before. What has changed is that there was a conflict with Azerbaijan before, now there is peace," said Nikol Pashinyan.
As for the statements coming from Russia that "Armenia can become a second Ukraine," the Armenian premier noted: "I believe and am convinced that such a thing will not happen."
