European Union Ready to Provide “Non-lethal” Military Aid to Armenia

YEREVAN — The European Union is considering providing “non-lethal” military aid to Armenia, EU Ambassador to Armenia Vassilis Maragos said at a parliamentary herrings on “New Perspectives and Challenges of the European Integration of Armenia.”

“At the request of Armenia, the European Union is considering support to Armenian Armed Forces, non-lethal support, a substantial one, to strengthen their capacities,” the Ambassador said.

“We are talking about significant assistance that would strengthen [the country’s] capailities,” Maragos told the Armenian parliament.

He said it would be provided from the European Peace Facility, a special fund designed to boost EU partners’ defense capacity. Armenian parliament speaker Alen Simonyan revealed last July that Yerevan requested “technical assistance” from the fund but was rebuffed by Brussels.

“A new partnership agenda between Armenia and EU is being shaped, and it is the ambition of the Armenian people to shape an agenda which will take partnership further. We share common values, we share our commitment to multilateralism and rules-based international order. This is extremely important and I hope and believe that we are going to achieve very concrete results together,” Vassilis Maragos said.

He stressed that the EU is willing to take the partnership to a higher level.

A team of officials from the EU’s executive body, the European Commission, and External Action Service discussed the matter with Armenian leaders during a November visit to Yerevan. In a statement on their trip, the EU said it “will further explore non-lethal support to the Armenian military via the European Peace Facility.”

Maragos said in early December that the EU will send in the coming weeks a “technical mission” to Armenia that will come up with “concrete proposals” regarding such aid after assessing the country’s security needs. Neither the EU nor the Armenian government has reported such a visit so far.