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Armenian parliament to ratify EEU membership despite public disagreements

28 October 2014 [18:50] - TODAY.AZ

/AzerNews/

/By Mushvig Mehdiyev

The Armenian parliament plans to ratify an agreement on the Eurasian Economic Union membership by the end of 2015.

The president of the country will submit the document to the parliament after the submission of the Constitutional Court's conclusion, Head of Parliament's Foreign Relations Commission Artak Zakaryan said. "For now, I cannot announce about a specific date for now, nevertheless, the document should be ratified by the end of this year. We will review it in an extraordinary order if it is necessary," he stressed.

Armenia will not associate the ratification process with the same processes in the EEU member-states - Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus, Zakaryan noted. "I don't think that the processes should be bond to each other. Because, we are joining the agreement which has already been signed and ratified by the other member-states. Armenia will just ratify the part it has inked before."

Armenia's membership at the Eurasian Economic Union was officially confirmed by the Supreme Eurasian Economic Council in Minsk on October 10. Heads of the EEU member-states - Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus - signed the agreement on Armenia's joining the alliance. Armenia will be a full member of the EUU, being on a par with the other member-states. The Eurasian Economic Union will officially start its activity on January 1, 2015.

Armenia is on the verge of the official EEU entry, but the society still lacks a unanimous opinion about membership at the Russia-led alliance. APR Group, a leading group of public surveys, has published the data about the integration preferences of Armenian residents.

"Integration perspectives are always in the spotlight in Armenia and the mass media, political forces, government bodies, and civil organizations have repeatedly focused on it. People hold different opinions in the country in this regard," the group said.

APR Group surveyed about 1,300 Armenians in the districts and capital city Yerevan in this August, questioning "Should Armenia join any union?"

Results of the survey revealed the people in Armenia held different positions. Some 38.4 percent of the surveyed residents supported the EEU membership. About 24.8 percent emerged to be pro-Europeans to support the integration into EU. Around 11.8 percent think integrating into both alliances would be beneficial for Armenia, while roughly 10.1 percent preferred to ignore any alliance. About 15 percent found it difficult to answer.

The survey paved the way to portray the common image in Armenian society in terms of the integration into any alliance. Mostly the residents of rural regions, particularly men opted for joining the EEU over the EU integration. Most of them are ignorant or have imperfect knowledge, the survey revealed. Residents of Yerevan aged between 18 and 25 have unanimously supported the integration into Europe. Women's domination among Armenia's pro-European minds is an interesting moment to attach attention.

Notwithstanding the different opinions in the society, Armenian authorities stayed loyal to its EEU-directed policy. They time by time carried out all necessary procedures for the EEU entry and Minsk conference, on October 10, was the crucial event to put pens to the document welcoming Armenia as a fourth member of the economic union. Now the post-Soviet state's legislative body is about to validate the membership at the EEU, in the other words, Armenia is knocking on the alliance's door to come in and sit around the table with Russia, Kazakhstan and Belarus.

URL: http://www.today.az/news/regions/137248.html

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