VLADIVOSTOK, September 13. /TASS/. Moscow has more and more questions for Yerevan over Armenia's recent actions, especially in light of the Armenian side's ratification of the Rome Statute of the International Criminal Court (ICC), Russian Foreign Ministry Spokeswoman Maria Zakharova said.
"Yerevan's motivation should still be qualified, explained and clarified by the Armenian side, not by us. <...> By the way, they have presented their assessments, but we consider such steps as unfriendly, which we have repeatedly told our Armenian colleagues, partners, friends through bilateral channels, but at some point we began to speak in public, precisely because more and more questions come up," she said at a briefing on the sidelines of the Eastern Economic Forum (EEF).
Zakharova recalled that Armenia's ambassador to Moscow, Vagharshak Harutiunyan, was recently summoned to the Russian Foreign Ministry, where he was given a stern presentation in connection with Yerevan's unfriendly actions, which included launching the process of ratifying the Rome Statute of the ICC. "This is not merely an isolated move, which, as the Armenian side clearly understood, would raise questions from us, it is a series of connected moves, and in the course of summoning the ambassador and explaining our actions we talked about this, including publicly," the diplomat pointed out.
Earlier, a source in the Russian Foreign Ministry told TASS that the Russian side warned its Armenian counterparts that joining the Rome Statute could entail extremely negative consequences for relations with Russia. The Foreign Ministry added that Moscow considers Yerevan's plans to sign off on the Rome Statute of the ICC unacceptable against the background of "arrest warrants" issued for the Russian leadership.