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On December 7 the Chairperson of the NA Standing Committee on European Integration Naira Zohrabyan met with the Extraordinary and Plenipotentiary Ambassador of Estonia to RA Thomas Luk (residence Tbilisi).

Emphasizing the agreement of the cooperation signed on European integration between the ministries of foreign affairs between Estonia and Armenia during the meeting Mrs Zohrabyan noted that it was also necessary to make more dynamic the cooperation between the parliaments for more effectively applying the flexible levers of the parliamentary diplomacy. The Committee Chairperson emphasized that Estonia had already removed the visa regime for the persons having diplomatic passport, expressing hope that until the end of the year the general negotiations over facilitating the visa regime with EU will launch.

Touching upon the Eastern Partnership and emphasizing not only bilateral partnership, but also the multilateral format Mr Zohrabyan noted that, unfortunately, the rules of the Eastern Partnership game do not equally function for all the countries. Naira Zohrabyan noted that the official Azerbaijan refused the cooperation with Armenia within the format of the partnership and underlined the statement made by Aliyev lately on leaving out Armenia from all regional programmes. The Committee Chairperson expressed perplexity that the EU continued not to respond in any way to  Azerbaijan’s deconstructive steps and work style. Mrs Zohrabyan noted that she also expected the response of EU to the bellicose announcements and consecutive steps to increase the military budget sounding by Azerbaijan. The parties also discussed the issue of NK conflict, in the context of which the Committee Chairperson emphasized the implementation of the humanitarian programmes in the NK by EU, noting that not being recognized does not deprive the Artsakh people from the human basic rights. Mrs Zohrabyan underscored that according to the reports of the international different organizations with regards to the human rights and democracy the Nagorno Karabakh had higher indices that many countries of the region.

During the meeting other issues of bilateral interest were also discussed.