Russian ambassador warns the West is attempting to open a ‘second front’ in Armenia

Russia’s Ambassador to Armenia has claimed that the West is attempting to open a ‘second front’ in Armenia, in a statement perceived by some as a veiled threat to Yerevan that echoed similar sentiments spoken about Georgia.

Ambassador Sergei Kopyrkin issued the statement on Friday.

While Moscow respects Armenia’s right as a sovereign country to establish relations with whichever country it wants to, Kopyrkin said, the Kremlin ‘expects that our Armenian allies will not allow the Russophobic forces in the West to use their beautiful country to open a  “second front” of confrontation with Russia’.

The ruling Georgian Dream party, as well as Russian officials, have regularly claimed that the West has sought to force Georgia to open a ‘second front’ against Russia, referring to the full-scale invasion of Ukraine and theories that the war is a proxy conflict between the West and Russia.

Georgian Dream officials have also alleged that the West enacted punitive measures against Georgia because Tbilisi refused to enter the war against Russia.

In a similar vein, Kopyrkin claimed that other countries were openly trying to stoke the conflict between Armenia and Russia, using ‘political manipulation, information operations, simple lies, and slander’.

‘Who is behind this is well known, as is their obsession with the “strategic defeat of Russia”. We look forward to the wisdom of the Armenian people, who perfectly understand who is a true friend and who is not a friend’, Kopyrkin told the Armenian opposition-aligned media outlet 168.am.

He further added that Russia ‘expects’ the Armenian people not to allow the West to ‘undermine’ Yerevan’s ‘process of Eurasian integration’.

The comments came as Armenia is seeking to reorient its geopolitical direction closer to the West. Previously, Russia was Armenia’s primary ally, but relations have deteriorated after Moscow repeatedly declined to lend support to Yerevan during subsequent conflicts with Azerbaijan following the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War.

A clear illustration of this shift came in March 2025, when the Armenian Parliament passed a bill urging the government to seek EU membership. Russia has reiterated that there would be economic consequences for Armenia if it joined the EU.

Currently, Armenia is a member of the Moscow-lead Eurasian Economic Union (EAEU), which, as with the EU, mandates its members to follow their own set of internal rules and standards, which are not compatible with each other. Both organisations also include a customs union — a free trade zone with unified trade tariffs on outside imports.

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OC MediaRobin Fabbro