Azatutyun.am – The head of Russia’s Foreign Intelligence Service (SVR) met with Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan in Yerevan on Monday three days after CIA Director William Burns’s unexpected arrival in Armenia.
The Armenian government’s press office said Sergei Naryshkin discussed with Pashinyan “international and regional security” and “processes taking place in the South Caucasus.” It did not elaborate.
The office used the same words in a statement on Pashinyan’s meeting with Burns held on Friday. It said they also touched upon “the fight against terrorism.”
Neither the CIA nor the U.S. State Department has commented so far on what was the first-ever publicized visit to Armenia by a CIA director.
Incidentally, state-run Russian media outlets were the first to reveal Burns’s visit. They did not link Naryshkin’s trip with it on Monday.
Tigran Grigorian, an Armenian political analyst, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service on Friday that U.S. and Russian security “experts” arrived in Yerevan in recent days for confidential discussions focusing on the war in Ukraine.
Burns, 66, is a former career diplomat who served as U.S. ambassador to Russia from 2005 to 2008. He visited Moscow in his current capacity last November. He reportedly warned the Kremlin against invading Ukraine.
Pashinyan’s press office implied that Russian-Armenian relations were also on the agenda of his talks with Naryshkin. It cited the Russian intelligence chief as praising the “high-level political dialogue between Russia and Armenia.”
The Armenian leader spoke with Russian Prime Minister Mikhail Mishustin by phone earlier in the day. According to the Russian government’s readout of the call, they discussed Russian-Armenian trade and the “implementation of large joint projects.”
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