December 13, 2018 - 14:38 AMT
4 days after Armenia vote, Moscow has not congratulated Pashinyan

Russian President Vladimir Putin has not congratulated acting Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan for a landslide victory in the December 9 parliamentary elections.

However, the Russian leader congratulated the head of the Republican Party of Armenia, third President Serzh Sargsyan the very next day of elections to the National Assembly in 2017.

The United States, the United Kingdom and the European Union, as well as Germany congratulated the new Armenian authorities and expressed their readiness to support them. Russia -- Armenia’s strategic ally -- weighed in on the elections only four days after the vote, with Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova merely mentioning the elections in her briefing.

Zakharova basically failed to congratulate the Armenian people or Pashinyan, whose side secured more than 70% of all the ballots cast.

The Russian foreign office just said that elections were held with no violations, adding that it expects a constructive dialogue with the new parliament and government in Armenia, “including within the framework of the Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO) and the Commonwealth of Independent States (CIS).”

By the way, the leaders of other member states of the EAEU have not congratulated Pashinyan either.

And for the record, Putin also congratulated second Armenian President Robert Kocharyan’s birthday on August 31. Kocharyan has been charged with overthrowing the constitutional order during peaceful protests that followed the presidential election of 2008.