West ‘sick and tired’ of urging Armenia to fight corruption - expert
The United States and Europe have got sick and tired of urging the Armenian authorities to combat corruption as a key impediment undermining the state, according to Manvel Sargsyan, Director of the Armenian Center for National and International Studies.
Summing up the key political developments of 2017, the expert cited espcially the high-ranking EU officials' calls for embarking on a serious anti-corruption campaign.
“We saw the [ruling] Republican Party’s reaction to all this. They initially stated that [the West] is making attempts to interfere with our domestic affairs, but some way or another, everybody realized that corruption is the country’s major problem. It was declared a central issue underlying the EU-Armenia framework agreement, and other arrangements urging Armenia to fight corruption and build a judiciary system. The Republic of Armenia has signed an agreement, but the question is what is going to happen in future,” he said in an interview with Tert.am.
Asked about the authorities’ accountability for the commitments agreed (given the considerable allocations by the EU), Sargsyan said he isn’t quite optimistic about future developments. “What do you think the Republicans are going to do now? Those people will try to derail the process yet another time,” he noted.
As for superpowers' interests in the developments expected in 2018, especially the election of Armenia's prime minister in 2018, the expert said he doesn't expect the recently signed Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement to increase the EU's influence on the process. “To be frank, I don’t think the EU will have its [preferred] candidate. They do not care about it. What they care about is the policy line,” he said, hesitating to predict the possible political rearrangements after the presidential election.
News.Az
Similar news
