YEREVAN, August 24. /TASS/. Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated that he supports the country’s withdrawal from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and would be pleased if this were to happen.

While presenting the government’s program for 2026-2031 from the parliamentary rostrum, the prime minister emphasized that Yerevan does not intend to increase its participation in the CSTO over the next five years.

"I know that discussions are underway within the CSTO. Incidentally, the charter provides for this: a country can be expelled. I would be very pleased if the organization expelled Armenia from the CSTO. At the very least, it would free us from the dilemma of whether or not to leave," Pashinyan noted.

According to him, Armenia’s interest in the CSTO has waned. At the same time, the prime minister gave a vague answer to the question of what Armenia plans to replace its CSTO membership with: strengthening relations with Turkey and Azerbaijan or applying for NATO membership, even though the country has not been invited to join.

In September 2024, Pashinyan emphasized that Yerevan had suspended its participation in the CSTO because the organization, in his opinion, posed a threat to the country’s sovereignty. In October 2024, at an international security forum in Warsaw, Armenian Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan noted that Yerevan was weighing all the risks associated with the decision to withdraw from the CSTO. In December, the Armenian prime minister announced that relations between Yerevan and the CSTO had reached a point of no return.

On June 10, Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov stated that the CSTO member states had agreed to consider applying the relevant article of the organization’s charter to Armenia due to its failure to pay dues for two consecutive years. On August 11, Russian Deputy Foreign Minister Mikhail Galuzin told TASS that stripping Armenia of its voting rights in the CSTO could be considered at the organization’s summit on November 11.