The exclusive interview of Avet Adonts, Armenia's Ambassador to the European Union and Belgium, to Mediamax

- Philippe Lefort was appointed the European Union Special Representative for the Southern Caucasus last week. The position was vacant since February 28 when former EU Representative Peter Semneby’s mandate expired. During this period EU was discussing whether or not the position should be preserved.

- Indeed, EU was discussing the institute of Special Representatives (they were operating not only in the Southern Caucasus) rather actively. After the Lisbon Treaty came into force, the European External Action Service was established to provide introduction of more centralized mechanisms of pursuing foreign policy.

After all, taking into account the fact that there are unsettled conflicts and interstate relations and other serious problems in the Southern Caucasus which require the EU’s active involvement, it was decided to preserve the institute of the Special Representative for this region. The EU decided that the institute will allow getting comprehensive assessments on the region.

We have discussed the issue with our European counterparts many times and have expressed the hope that the newly appointed Representative will act more effectively than his predecessor Peter Semneby. First of all, we mean that the Special Representative may use all the levers provided by the mandate to present to the EU and member-states more objective assessments on the developments in the region.

- Armenia and the EU are holding negotiations on the Association Agreement and both sides assess the process quite positively noting that a half of the issues are already agreed on. What volume of work is still to be done and what is the possible date for the completion of the negotiations?

- I would like to specify that the Association Agreement also includes the Deep and Compressive Free Trade Area (DCFTA) Agreement as well.  A document comprising 2 inseparable parts, political and economic, is due to be signed.

The half of the chapters in the first part is already agreed upon and the negotiation dynamics are rather positive. The delegations meet in Yerevan and Brussels every 3 months. Besides, discussions are held periodically through video conferences.

In the nearest future, we will start discussing issues related to conflicts and security with our European counterparts and I am sure that the positive dynamics will be maintained.

The end of the negotiations is already close but we shouldn’t forget that implementation of the signed documents should start afterwards and the practice shows that this phase also requires extensive work.

The negotiations on the second part of the document, DCFTA, haven’t started yet.

- This spring, European Commissioner Stefan Füle said in his interview to Mediamax that the negotiations will start “when Armenia is ready for it”. What did he mean?

- The negotiations with Georgia and Moldova, other “Eastern Partnership” members, haven’t started yet as well. By the way, the EU doesn’t intend to conclude a DCFTA Agreement with Azerbaijan as this country is not a member of the World Trade Organization and the WTO membership is one of the priority conditions for starting negotiations.

To start the negotiations, a country should carry out extensive reforms and bring its laws and procedures in line with the European Union’s standards.

The European Commission’s special economic mission visited Armenia and pointed out three main areas where the Armenian government should realize reforms: protection of intellectual property, elimination of trade barriers, spheres of phytosanitary and sanitary. The Armenian government has recently made a decision on approving the Action Plan aimed at resolving the indicated problems. After its realization we will be able to claim that Armenia is ready to start the negotiations on the DCFTA.

- So, even if the first part of the document is agreed upon by 100% it will not be signed until the negotiations on the second part are finished?

-Yes, there should be one joint package.

Negotiations on the DCFTA imply various reforms in our economic policy. For instance, in the EU countries’ shops, a CD or DVD costs at least EUR 15-20 and not EUR 2-3 as in Armenia today. Of course, such goods can be found in the EU countries as well - not in shops but in trade fairs or other such places. 

Under such circumstances, the EU strives to equate or at least bring the differences between economic conditions, tax and customs regimes to the minimum. I think the negotiation process itself may take less time than the preparatory work.

- I am sure our citizens are more interested in simplification of the visa regime to visit the EU countries. When are these negotiations to start?

- It’s a process which unfolds parallel to negotiations on the Association Agreement. It aims to simplify our citizens’ entrance to the EU countries by reducing the list of documents required by the Embassies of the EU countries as well as the time spent on this process. Today, we are facing a situation when a substantial part of our citizens do not apply for EU visas at all. They realize that they should collect numerous papers and spend much time having no guarantee they will get a visa.

These changes will allow boosting people to people contacts. Otherwise, the signing of the Association Agreement and DCFTA will simply become a self-goal.

In September, the EU member states will give a mandate to the European Commission to officially start the negotiations on the simplification of visa regime with Armenia. I think they will last for a few months as in fact the negotiations have already started since the Armenian side has already realized a number of necessary reforms.

Of course, the sides’ final goal is to remove the mutual visa requirement.

- How would you comment on “European Neighborhood Policy Review” resolution, approved by the European Parliament on April 7, 2011, in general, and item 49 of that document in particular, which contains an urge to develop confidence building measures and programs and develop “informal contacts and consultations with the societies of breakaway territories”?

- A number of European Parliament MPs have visited Armenia and then Nagorno Karabakh over the past year. As a result, they were declared “persona non grata” by the Azerbaijani authorities and appeared in the “black list” of this country.

Naturally, such situation is not acceptable for the European Parliament and its members who need to have an opportunity to visit non-recognized states to familiarize themselves with the situation there, for instance, problems of human rights’ protection, i.e. one of the priority goals of the adopted resolution is to make the MPs’ visits “legitimate”.

- The EU rather actively supported the process of settling Armenian-Turkish relations before the signing of the Protocols in 2009. Do you think the EU has a desire and levers to make Turkey restart the settling of relations now when the process is factually frozen?

- Indeed, the EU was very active and it made many efforts during the phase preceding the signing of the Protocols. I am sure that the European Union can use its levers more efficiently in the current situation to get the process back on the right track.