Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan told parliament on Monday that Yerevan will start the work of formally applying to join the European Union “in the near future.” He was presenting the government’s 2026–2031 program. It is the clearest signal yet that a country long tied to Moscow intends to put a membership file on Brussels’ desk.
Pashinyan’s sequence is deliberate. Armenia’s National Assembly already passed a law in March 2025 launching an EU accession process. He argued a national referendum only makes sense later — after an official application, after Brussels answers, and after there is a roadmap people can actually judge. Apply first, he said. Then talk about the vote.
That puts Armenia on a collision course with the clubs it still belongs to on paper. It remains a member of the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation, though it froze participation in 2024 after arguing the alliance failed it during the wars with Azerbaijan. Pashinyan said Armenia has no plan to resume CSTO activity over the next five years and that he would be “very glad” if the organisation simply expelled Yerevan, which would spare his government the choice of walking out. For now, he is not filing the resignation papers.
Moscow answered the same day. Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov said Armenia is free to leave the CSTO if it no longer wants the membership. On the EU application, he warned that aligning Armenian law with European trade, customs and phytosanitary rules would clash with Eurasian Economic Union standards and that those “deep contradictions” would “primarily harm Armenia itself.” He also told Yerevan to remember Turkey’s long, unfinished accession file.
The politics underneath are not new. Armenia still buys Russian energy and sits inside the EAEU. Four EAEU partners issued a joint statement in May pressing for a referendum that would force a choice between the EU and remaining in their bloc. Pashinyan called that a “friendly gesture” and said a referendum will happen — just not as the opening move. After last year’s peace process with Azerbaijan, he is betting that Brussels, not the CSTO, is the security and economic bet that matters.
None of this is membership. An application starts a slog that can last years, and Peskov’s Turkey reminder is the sort of line Brussels-watchers know too well. What changed this week is that Armenia’s prime minister stopped talking about the process in the abstract and put a timeline on the paperwork.