 armenia reloaded 2013 elections and shuttle diplomacy euarmenia foto  photographic service of the council of the eu  european communities elections in the postsoviet space are i ncr easin gl y an european task and respon si bilit y but mostly are leaving everything the wa y it is just take a look on ukraine armenia is also preparing to hold elections in 2013 the european union is getting ready for surprises but is more prepared after the ukraine s election in 2012 perhaps  there are more sticks than carrots for eu support of euarmenian relations but russia is offering more security carrots than democracy sticks but everything depends on armenia on february 18 2013 armenia is going to be asked to elect a new president the 2013 presidential election campaign officially launched today 21 january 2013  as armenianowcom reported  and the candidates are already known  serzh sargsyan  see his campaign platform here  the armenian president in office  hrant bagratyan  see his campaign platform here  a former prime minister and the leader of freedom party  raffi hovhannisian  see his campaign platform here  a former foreign minister and the leader of zharangutiun heritage party  paruyr hayrikyan  see his campaign platform here  a prominent sovietera dissident and the head of the national selfdetermination party  arman melikyan  a former foreign minister of nagornokarabakh republic  andrias ghukasyan  a political analyst and head of radio hay  vardan sedrakyan  a specialist in epics and aram harutyunyan  leader of national consent party will compete for the presidency however  stepa safaryan general secretary of zharangutiun heritage party pointed out serzh sargsyan and raffi hovannisian as most likely votegetters in the presidential elections  cited by arka news agency  of course the other candidates could seek avenues to mount a challenge to the present president but the opposition is so fragmentated and n o one of the candidates is going to back any of the eight candidates running for president in armenia  as armenianowcom reported  it is inevitab le that there would b e disputes about the outcome of the election but the justice minister hrayr tovmasyan points out in advance that the 2013 presidential election will be most democratic in armenia s history i am convinced that this election will be most stainless and democratic and that it will leave behind all the previous elections  he was quoted  armenian police vladimir gasparyan speaking at the opening of a threeday workshop for prosecutors and defense attorneys in yerevan stated that armenia will pass the upcoming election test with brilliance  he was quoted  does europe tru st them t o pl ay their part correctly as guardian of the justice or does europe trust foreign minister edward nalbandian who also stated that the armenian government is committed to holding next month s presidential election in conformity with european standards election in conformity with european standards will be the key but it seems to me a ma tter of great urgency that there will be another reality of course it is hard to expect from noneu member to compete with standards within the european union although member states faces many difficulties coming from membership t he expansion of eu decision making limits the range of party policy positions at elections policy convergence means parties taking positions in the issue space closer to those held by their rivals and that consequently the distribution of party positions becomes more compact eu legislation restricts the policy alternatives available to governments and due to the electoral link to parties and citizens the more responsibility is assigned to the eu the less room there is for parties to offer credible policy alternatives that differ markedly from eu legislation  kyriaki nanou and han dorussen argue  t he eu would b e well advised t o set very a mbitious targets for its eastern partnership policy as the evident risks to democracy in the immediate neighbourhood call for greater sustainability and consequence  what is happening with freedoms in armenia    the truth is that time is ru nnin g out and the re is st il l a lot to be done in armenia  recently freedom house   control risks   fraser institute   world economic forum and price waterhouse cooper published their recent reports on freedoms in the world but a ct ual r esults di ffe r fro m those reflected in the forwardlooking statements regarding freedom house report  freedom in the world 2013  armenia is a partly free country the net is partly free but the press is not free the regime is classified as a semiconsolidated authoritarian regime due to the  riskmap report 2013  armenia is presented as a country with high political and security risks on issues related the economy for armenia is s om e light a t the end of t he tunnel the fraser institute report  economic freedom of the world  ranks armenia 53 and considers it as a relatively free country the 2013 election should be a signal to europe we are carrying out our european path the world economic forum report  the global enabling trade report 2012  ranks armenia 13 worldwide for market access and 59 in terms of the overall extent to which it has developed institutions policies and services facilitating the free flow of goods over borders price waterhouse cooper in its most recent  doing business in armenia guide  reported that armenia encourages foreign trade and investment and that s urveys suggest that armenia is a relatively easy country in which to do business concerns are coming from other sides too policy forum armenia r eport entitled  armenia s 2012 parliamentary election  summarizes the report demonstrates that the election fraud in armenia has taken subtle and sophisticated forms that are difficult to detect because it occurs mostly outside of the polling stations in fact while acknowledging some marginal improvements we believe that the systematic fraud applied by the authorities and uncovered in the report via the use of statistical techniques was sufficient to materially alter the election outcome a delegation of the parliamentary assembly of the council of europe pace has already concerns mainly about the continuing substantial inaccuracies in the voter lists as armenianowcom reported  head of the pace election monitoring mission karin woldseth said that the delegation was disappointed to see that the previous recommendations regarding the voter lists have not been implemented whereas accurate voter lists are an essential prerequisite for any proper election  so ther e ar e a lot of issues to be solved before the election analyzing the results i conclude in terms of democratic freedoms armenia demonstrates a lack of political commitment on democracy progress in terms of economic freedoms armenia is making some valuable progress these developments could have consequences for the relations with the european union and russia but is the european union prepared for surprises  shuttle diplomacy and reassurement over european path   shuttle diplomacy graphic   hristofor hrisoskulov a lot of diplomats shuttled between brussels and yerevan and vice versa in 2012 and at the beginning of 2013 on the european side  herman van rompuy   jose manuel barroso   stefan füle and catherine ashton visited yerevan the eu member states bulgaria sweden and poland supported the eu in this context in december 2012 bulgarian foreign minister nikolay mladenov swedish foreign minister carl bildt and polish foreign minister radoslav sikorski paid a visit to armenia during a trip in the south caucasus on the armenian side  serzh sargsyan  president of armenia  tigran sargsyan  prime minister  hovik abramyan  speaker of the armenian parliament  gagik tsarukyan  leader of the armenian political party prosperous armenia and edward nalbandian  armenian foreign minsiter visited brussels the question is  what is hidden behind all the statemnets made after every meeting  in order to answer the question i picked up four words namely elections   association agreement   visa  agreement facilitation and liberalization and europ eu as repeated in the statements attached as a link behind the mentioned names above in this way a specific picture of euarmenia relations shifted into t he foreground as a model of future relations  there are more sticks than carrots for eu support of euarmenian relations    the words  association agreemnet and visa agreement facilitation and liberalization have been used by the officials 17 times whereas the word elections 19 times  association agreement and visa appear in the context of offering something of rewarding some performance done whereas elections has been used in the context of advising and instructing the other part in this sense armenia to be crucial on the upcoming events in the country with regard to europe eu counted 66 times i should like briefly to go into the common proposals in the statements which now come wit hi n a w ide r context thi s app li es for example to the proposal on supporting the european path of armenia and c on firming the appro ac h alr ead y taken it seems that european officials are still skeptical about the armenian government s intention to integrate with the european community they do not completely trust these assurances as all steps taken by armenia so far in this direction have mostly been of a declarative nature meanwhile democratic reforms that are a condition for european integration have not become tangible in armenia yet still political analyst levon margaryan thinks that the relations between armenia and the eu have been taken to a new level where armenia should prove that it is ready to bring not only its laws but also practices in line with european standards  as armenianowcom reported  growing competition between the west and russia for influence in armenia economy and democracy vs security  a lot of diplomats shuttled between yerevan and moscow too armenian president serzh sargsyan visited russia attending the summits of the cis and the russiadominated collective security treaty organization csto   vladimir putin dmitri medvedev and chairman of both chambers of the state duma and ministers visited on their side yerevan and mr putin goes further i want to reiterate that the countries of the commonwealth are our most intimate in the true sense of the word strategic partners virtually all aspects of interaction with you are vital for our country putin said cited by massis post  i t w as not wi thout rea son t ha t us foreign minister hillary clinton warned on the situation in the postsoviet space and the rising attempts of vladimir putin to get closer to russia all the neighbouring countries as she stated   there is a move to resovietise the region  andrew weiss who served on the national security council under president bill clinton and now is at the us rand corporation thinktank said mr putin made clear when he returned to the presidency this year that he planned to focus on bolstering russia s influence in its neighbourhood but he added elites in the neighbouring states show little enthusiasm for simply handing over their autonomy and sovereignty to moscow  charles clover writes in the financial times  2012 has showed that armenian authorities feel like developing closer relations with the west but are not going to spoil relations with russia moreover a certain division of labor could be noticed armenia seems to have entrusted its security to russia as a member of the collective security treaty organization but is seeking to integrate with the european union and develop closer ties with the united states in terms of economy and democracy  armenianowcom reported  and secretary of armenia s national security council artur baghdasaryan believes that armenia s integration into the european union eu should not be contrasted with its integration into the eurasian union   tertam reports    in relations with countries in the postsoviet space russia s approach differs from the eu s approach there are more security carrots than democracy sticks    so just let me give few examples of how russia is trying to integrate armenia into russianled organizations russian news agencies citing the kremlin disseminated a slightly odd piece of information saying that russian president vladimir putin has agreed with the government s proposal to hold talks with armenia for the signing of the agreement on the development of militarytechnical cooperation and that after the conclusion of the negotiations the government has been instructed to sign an agreement with this country  as armenianowcom reported  and lisa karpova in pravdaru  to further develop russianarmenian cooperation president vladimir putin s government appointed the russian transport minister maxim sokolov as cochairman for the bilateral commission which has the task of drafting a roadmap of russianarmenian economic relations until 2020 a joint document was signed after dmitri medvedev visited armenia it envisaged russian military presence in armenia and joint protection of armenia s borders by the armenian and russian armed forces  as tertam reported  due to its geographic location armenia is really concerned on security issues for sure the nagornokarabakh conflict and other conflicts in the immediate neighbourhood are topics that should be taken into consideration regarding armeian foreign policy gordon n bardos in his article   spectre of separatism haunts europe   in the national interest argues that balkans and the caucasus are the stuff of nightmares for cartographers and diplomats trying to reconcile competing ethnic claims to territory in the caucasus and eastern anatolia abkhazia chechnya nagornokarabakh south ossetia the kurds of eastern turkey and northern iraq and the turks of northern cyprus have all declared some form of independence or autonomy of course in accordance with russian offers the european union is asked to do more than statements the eu has a strong interest in a stable neighbourhood this is the raison d etre of our european neighbourhood and eastern partnership policies the eu actively supports the mediation process of the osce minsk group we have important assistance projects to build confidence between the parties to the conflict while the efforts of our eu special representative for the south caucasus and the conflict in georgia ambassador lefort fully support the efforts of the minsk group in a complementary way  jose manuel barroso stated in a interview with mediamax  it is t herefore my view that the european union would have be en well advised to precisely f ol low the thinking in armenia but consequently and sustainable to stand up for rights international conventions and democracy and als o stron gly reaffirm as a pre ss ing requiremen t of free and fair elections  see the original article here   