Armenian, Russian Army Chiefs Discuss Military Cooperation

MOSCOW — Armenia’s and Russia’s top army generals have met in Moscow for talks highlighting high-level military contacts between the two states that have intensified after last year’s war in Nagorno-Karabakh.

The Armenian Defense Ministry said on Friday that Lieutenant-General Artak Davtyan discussed with his Russian opposite number, General Valery Gerasimov, “a number of issues of bilateral military cooperation” during the meeting held on Thursday.

A short ministry statement gave no details of Davtyan’s trip to Moscow. The Russian Defense Ministry issued no press releases on the talks.

The chief of the Armenian army’s General Staff flew to the Russian capital five days after Russian Defense Minister Sergei Shoigu and his Armenian counterpart Vagharshak Harutiunyan spoke by phone for a second time in as many weeks.

According to the Defense Ministry in Yerevan, Shoigu and D Harutiunyan discussed Russia’s ongoing peacekeeping operation in Karabakh, activities of a joint Russian-Armenian military contingent and “the main directions of large-scale reforms” of the Armenian army launched after the war.

Harutiunyan also discussed the reforms with Gerasimov in a March 23 phone call. The minister’s press office said they agreed that a high-ranking Russian delegation will visit Armenia soon for more detailed talks on the subject.

A delegation led by one of Gerasimov’s deputies already held weeklong negotiations with the Armenian army’s top brass in Yerevan in January. Harutiunyan said afterwards that the talks were aimed at “assisting us in the reform and modernization of Armenia’s armed forces.”