Pashinyan attends Victory Day parade in Moscow for the second time

On Friday, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan attended the commemoration events dedicated to the 80th Anniversary of the Soviet Union’s victory over Nazi Germany, held in Moscow. Pashinyan is the only South Caucasus leader attending the parade, marking his second time participating in the Moscow celebrations since coming to power in 2018.

There was no official Georgian representation at the Moscow commemoration, as there are no official diplomatic relations between Georgia and Russia. Additionally, at the last minute, Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said he was not going.

In last-minute cancellation, Aliyev will not attend Moscow Victory Day celebration

The news of the cancellation was announced by Kremlin official Yuri Ushakov.

OC MediaNate Ostiller

Pashinyan arrived in Russia on Thursday evening, just days after Armenia accused Russia of waging a hybrid war against the republic.

During a dinner that same evening in honour of the heads of foreign delegations, Pashinyan informally met with foreign colleagues, including Russian President Vladimir Putin.

Pashinyan was also seen having a short conversation with Belarusian President Aliaksandr Lukashenka.

Ties between Armenia and Belarus have been in freefall since spring 2024, leading to a statement by Pashinyan in June that no Armenian officials would visit Belarus while Lukashenka was in power, due to the latter’s support for Azerbaijan during the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War.

Pashinyan only officially confirmed his visit to Moscow on Wednesday. However, prior to that, the Kremlin announced that during a 13 March phone call between Pashinyan and Putin, the former had ‘accepted’ Putin’s invitation to take part in the Moscow celebrations.

On Wednesday, Pashinyan also said that his government had adopted ‘a balanced and balancing foreign policy’ and that ‘the logic’ of the policy did ‘not imply that we will avoid visits to Russia [...] or refrain from developing and deepening relations with it’.

Aside from emphasising the importance of the 9 May commemorations, Pashinyan also said that such gatherings provide an opportunity to discuss bilateral issues.

Before the celebration, Russia published a list of 13 countries whose soldiers would participate in the parade — Armenia was not on the list, unlike Azerbaijan.

On Thursday, Parliamentary Speaker Alen Simonyan said during a press briefing that he was unaware why Armenia was not sending soldiers to take part in the parade, but said that he considered Pashinyan’s participation ‘more than enough’.

Talking about Pashinyan’s decision to take part, Simonyan suggested that it was solely due to the fact that Armenia has a large number of World War II veterans.

‘We cannot renounce what those people did’, Simonyan said.

Around 300,000 Armenians were killed during World War II.

Meanwhile, in Armenia, officials led by President Vahagn Khachaturyan and Parliamentary Speaker Alen Simonyan paid tribute to the memory of World War II victims in Yerevan’s Victory Park.

Putin urges Georgians to ‘preserve the good traditions of friendship’ ahead of Victory Day

Russian President Vladimir Putin specifically congratulated the people of Georgia and Moldova as opposed to those countries’ heads of state.

OC MediaXandie (Alexandra) Kuenning