Posted on 03/24/2014 5:29:30 AM PDT by PaulCruz2016
Armenia has backed Crimea’s choice of joining Russia, supporting the right to self-determination for the peninsula’s population. In response, Ukraine has recalled its ambassador to Armenia.
"Armenia's principled position on the right to self-determination remains unchanged and has been repeatedly expressed over the years," Armenia's deputy foreign minister, Shavarsh Kocharyan, told Ukrainian Ambassador Ivan Kukhta, as quoted by the Armenian Foreign Ministry's press service.
(Excerpt) Read more at rt.com ...
Russian Spring?
THEN:
America Backs Right To Self-determination
NOW:
Armenia Backs Right To Self-determination
Armenia is joining the Customs Union Of Russia-Belarus-Kazakhstan.
It relies for survival on trade with Russia. As it cannot afford to offend Russia, its fallen in line with Belarus in recognition of Crimea’s accession to the Russia Federation.
Why misinform?
It’s certainly reasonable to expect that Armenia wants to maintain good relations with the big kid in the neighborhood, but not only is Armenia NOT joining the Customs Union of Russia, Belarus and Kazakhstan, it cannot! It shares no border with any of those nations!
Its borders are Geogria, Azerbaijan, Turkey and Iran.
Bulgaria and Germany are both larger trade partners than Russia, and collectively the E.U. is a much, much larger trade partner. So it makes little sense to offend the E.U. to make nice with Russia.
Neither do the Baltic States have any land borders with the EU. But they’re still in it.
Geographical discontinuity is no barrier to a country joining a trading bloc.
the Baltic States share a border with Poland.
But R-K-B is a CUSTOMS union. It makes no sense to have a customs union with a nation you do not share a border with.
Lithuania borders the Russian exclave of Kaliningrad.
Who says that is an ironclad requirement?
The UK has no land border with any EU country.
Lithuania DOES border the Kalingrad exclave. They ALSO border Poland. If the exclave border extended all the way to isolate Poland, it wouldn’t be an exclave!
The point of a customs union is that you do not have to check customs as a good is shipped from nation to another. If you necessarily have another nation in between, what’s the point? While there are no land borders between the UK and the rest of the EU, there are also no other nations in between, and there is, as point of fact, a railway between the UK and EU.
That said, I’ll grant you that Georgia is sought after for the Customs Union, which would plainly pave the way for Armenia. And what was a Customs Union is set to become an EU-style trade area, which means that even if you can’t use a commons customs, Armenia still has a motivation for joining.
Armenia borders Turkey. Russia is a traditional enemy of Turkey. Maybe that's behind Armenia's attitude. Plus it has a dispute with Azerbaijan--the Azerbaijani language is very close to Turkish and the Azerbaijanis are Muslims.
“The UK has no land border with any EU country.”
So you don’t recognize Northern Ireland?
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