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Armenian deputy foreign minister has made clarifications regarding the reasons for not appointing the representative of Armenia to the post of the Secretary General of the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO).

“The initial decision was adopted to rotate the CSTO Secretary General every three years, choosing in turn a representative from one of the countries on the basis of the Russian alphabet. So the right to submit the candidacy was set to first go to Armenia. However, the rotations principle was decided to apply effective from January 1, 2017 with the expected candidate from Armenia. There was no consensus at the session of the CSTO Collective Security Council held in Yerevan though with a request to discuss the matter in the next session. The following session held last year was not attended by the President of Belarus that further delayed the adoption of decision. As a result, starting from January 1 we have Deputy Secretary General as an incumbent Secretary General since he could hold the post no more. The upcoming session will spread light on the matter,” Kocharyan said at a briefing with reporters on Thursday.

Kocharyan next insisted that Armenia’s representative is set to take up the post with the relevant decision to be adopted during the upcoming summit of the military organization.

He also dismissed media speculations that some of SCTO member states, namely Belarus and Kazakhstan, opposed Armenia’s candidate to hold the post as “not corresponding to reality.”
“I can only state that Kazakhstan has never caused impediments for the matter, while the absence of the Belarusian President during the last summit brought certain problems,” added the deputy minister.