CSTO: Lavrov announces draft to suspend Armenia’s voting rights, to go before the Moscow summit
- Published
- Place
- Moscow, Russia
- Event date
- Past event —
Summary
CSTO member states will propose suspending Armenia’s voting rights in the organisation because Yerevan has not paid its dues for more than two years. Sergei Lavrov announced it in Moscow on Tuesday, 10 November, after a joint meeting of the foreign ministers, defence ministers and security council secretaries of the Collective Security Treaty Organisation. Armenia’s delegation did not take part. The draft would also suspend Yerevan’s right to put forward Armenian citizens for quota-based posts until the debt is paid in full. Heads of state will consider it on Wednesday, 11 November, at the summit chaired by Vladimir Putin. Russia’s foreign minister said Armenia would keep its core rights, including collective security. And he added that Russia will not throw it out.
Lavrov presented the measure at a joint press conference with CSTO Secretary General Taalatbek Masadykov. In his words, there is “no room for a double interpretation”: since 2024, Yerevan has stopped paying its annual contribution to the common budget. Hence the use of Article 25 of the Charter, which covers a member in arrears for more than two years.
The text mentions neither expulsion nor any military penalty. It freezes two things: Armenia’s vote in CSTO bodies, and the appointment of its nationals to the secretariat, until full payment. “Even after this decision, our Armenian colleagues will retain all the essential rights under the treaty,” the Russian minister stressed.
“If they want us to expel Armenia, we won’t”
Asked about Nikol Pashinyan, who said on 5 November that Armenia’s interest in the CSTO had “run its course”, Lavrov replied that no official request to withdraw had been received. Not from the CSTO, and not from the Eurasian Economic Union either.
The minister accused the Armenian prime minister of saying the organisation no longer serves Armenia without drawing the conclusion. “If so, then they should leave,” he said. Then: “If they want us to kick Armenia out, we will not do that.” The door, he repeated, remains open.
He also recalled that an Armenian law launching the process of joining the European Union was passed more than a year ago, which he considers incompatible with membership of the Eurasian Economic Union.
A freeze in place since 2024
Armenia froze its participation in the CSTO in February 2024. Yerevan accuses its allies of failing to honour their defence commitments in 2021 and 2022, when Azerbaijan attacked Armenian territory. The organisation brings together Russia, Belarus, Armenia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan.
In August, the chair of parliament’s foreign relations committee, Sarkis Khandanyan, had already said Yerevan would “take note” of such a decision and saw no reason to resume active participation. On Wednesday, Nikol Pashinyan will be in Antalya for COP31, not in Moscow.
Analysis
Moscow is choosing an accounting route rather than a rupture. Suspending a vote over unpaid dues lets the CSTO record Armenia’s absence without pronouncing an expulsion, which the Charter does not provide for anyway. The message cuts two ways. To Yerevan: the ball is in your court, leave formally if you wish. To the other members: the organisation enforces its rules. For Armenia, little changes day to day, since it no longer takes part. But the decision would put in writing the political divorce that began in 2024.
Possible consequences
The Collective Security Council is due to decide on Wednesday, 11 November, in Moscow. The decision needs the agreement of the heads of state present. Yerevan has not yet officially reacted to Lavrov’s announcement.
