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Issue of Russian border guards’ pullout from Yerevan airport settled — Armenian speaker

Alen Simonyan said the Russian border guards will pull out of Zvartnots by August 1, 2024

YEREVAN, March 27. /TASS/. The withdrawal of Russian border guards from Yerevan’s Zvartnots airport is a done deal, so Yerevan and Moscow are no longer discussing it, Armenian Speaker Alen Simonyan said during a briefing.

"Armenia considers the issue settled, so I do not think any discussion is ongoing here. There is an attempt to portray this process as a breach of the interstate agreement. It was an interagency agreement, and its purpose was to help Armenian border guards in that section and make things easier for them. There is no longer a need to lighten their burden. We said that we were grateful for your help, but now we do not need this help," he said, adding that the Russian border guards will pull out of Zvartnots by August 1, 2024.

Additionally, Simonyan said that Armenia and Russia were not negotiating the Russian border guards’ withdrawal from the Armenian-Turkish border, where they were deployed under the 1992 bilateral agreement.

"There was no such conversation, not in this instance," he said in response to a reporter’s question.

Nevertheless, Simonyan questioned whether the Russian border guards would defend the border "if Turkey decides to attack Armenia."

Earlier this month, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that Armenian border guards had notified their Russian counterparts that Yerevan was capable of ensuring the smooth operation of border control functions at the Zvartnots airport without Russian assistance. Prior to that, Armenian Security Council Secretary Armen Grigoryan said that Yerevan had sent an official letter to Moscow asking it to discontinue the operations of Russian border guards at the airport.

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