Armenian and Belarusan National Platforms share common ambiguity

The matter concerns ambiguity in relations of Belarus and Armenia with the EU. But if our country has been in this status for a long time, Armenia is unfamiliar with that.

In the period between the meeting of the IV Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum that took place on November 20-21, 2014 in Batumi and the conference of the Belarusan National Platform that is to take place in Minsk on December 22 an interesting event happened in the life of the organized Belarusan civil society: a delegation of representatives of the Armenian National Platform visited Minsk. They took part in the conference devoted to the post-communist transformations as well as organized discussion with the participants of the Belarusan National Platform. Boris Navardasyan, a representative of the Armenian delegation, the head of the Yerevan press club, shared his impressions re this visit with the EuroBelarus Information Service.

- What increases the actuality of enhanced cooperation between the Armenian and the Belarusan National Platforms?

- The Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum was at the crossroads, and the meeting in Batumi was the first one after the Eastern Partnership disintegrated. Now the interaction of the countries-partners with the EU differs from one another a lot, and that is the reason why consultations between the National Platforms of the countries that found themselves in different situations are needed. For instance, the Armenian and the Belarusan National Platforms share a lot in common when it comes to the format and content of our countries with the EU, which are very ambiguous now. If for Belarus this ambiguity has existed for many years, it is new to Armenia. And it is extremely important to define the agenda and priorities for the Forum, as well as understand how we can use the experience of the countries that signed the EU Association Agreement.

- What do you think is the main result of the Armenian delegation’s visit?

- First of all, it is comprehension that the National Platforms can play big role in the Eastern Partnership Civil Society Forum. There is no common position about it in the Forum. There are opinions that the National Platforms are a base that defines the work of the Forum. As all our contacts including the visit of the Belarusan colleagues to Armenia and our visit to Minsk make us believe that we will be able to promote our vision of CSF strategy, its priorities. All the more that as we are not the worst in the Eastern Partnership in terms of institutional power as the research shows.