Yerevan /Mediamax/. Director of Russia’s Federal Security Service (FSS) Alexander Bortnikov said that the West is “inclining Yerevan to delay negotiations with Baku.”

TASS reports that speaking at a meeting of the Council of Heads of Security Bodies and Special Services of the CIS in Astana, Bortnikov said:

“The Americans and Europeans are clearly not interested in establishing stability in Transcaucasia. By inclining Yerevan to delay negotiations with Baku, the West is trying to lead the process of Azerbaijani-Armenian settlement and achieve the deployment of its own ‘peacekeeping’ contingent in the region - de jure under the auspices of the UN, but de facto under the auspices of NATO. The possible nature of such “peacekeeping” is already indicated by intelligence activities conducted by the so-called independent civilian observation mission of the EU deployed on the border of Armenia and Azerbaijan in the interests of a particular NATO country against Russia and our partners.”

The director of the Russian Federal Security Service noted that “in exchange for favorable arms supplies and security guarantees, the West is pushing the Armenian government to withdraw from the CSTO, which will make Yerevan even more dependent on the North Atlantic Alliance for its future relations with Baku”.