Epress.am News from Armenia
At a joint press conference today, Noravank Scientific and Educational Foundation Director Gagik Harutyunyan and member of the Defense Minister’s Public Council and military expert David Jamalyan spoke about the public mood, discussing what informational-psychological components emerged in the context of the Armenian-Russian protocols.
Harutyunyan, noting that every major event has its informational-psychological component, said the Armenia-Russia agreement also found a public response. As for the reaction by the Azerbaijani public, Harutyunyan said that in certain strata in Azerbaijan, skepticism toward their own authorities is apparent.
“Azerbaijan’s foreign policy is experiencing failures: for example, in Azerbaijan-Iran relations. Turkey-Azerbaijan relations, it seems, aren’t satisfying Baku. It seems that Azerbaijan has become a toy in the hands of the superpowers,” said the Noravank Director.
On the Armenian public’s reaction, Harutyunyan noted that it was quite positive, however, according to him, Russia’s image in Armenia hasn’t sufficiently been revealed: imperial perceptions still reign among the public.
“In Armenia-Russia relations, Armenians only see the killings carried out in Russia, and just focusing on that, I believe, isn’t so appropriate,” said Harutyunyan.
Jamalyan, in turn, focused his attention toward Russia’s sale of C-300 missile devices to Azerbaijan.
“Russia is adopting its policy, it has its interests: It will always strive to keep Azerbaijan in its orbit. Of course, it’s not excluded, that it can use the C-300 in some way against us [Armenia], but that doesn’t mean that our forces can’t confront that. Also the C-300 sale doesn’t mean that the threat of war becomes obvious,” said Jamalyan.