The State Duma postponed the recognition of Armenia’s driving rights in Russia

The State Duma postponed for an indefinite period the consideration of the draft law on the recognition of driving rights of citizens of Armenia for work and business in Russia. The head of the transport committee Yevgeny Moskvychev said that the adoption of such a law “does not correspond to the interests of the country at the moment.” This is reported by RBC.

The draft law was adopted by the State Duma in the first reading in June 2022. RBC calls Moskvychev the initiator of the suspension of his further consideration.

The speaker of the State Duma, Vyacheslav Volodin, explained the decision of the deputies by the fact that the Armenian authorities have not confirmed the status of the Russian language in the country. “The leadership and the government have not taken any steps to consolidate the status of the Russian language, and it is on this basis that we make a decision to allow the use of national driver’s licenses of other countries on the territory of Russia,” he said. According to Volodyn, citizens of Belarus, Kazakhstan and Kyrgyzstan can use the driver’s license of their countries on the territory of Russia, because “the Russian language is constitutionally enshrined in them.”

• At the beginning of October, the Parliament of Armenia ratified the Rome Statute at its session on Tuesday, which obliges the country to comply with the decisions of the International Criminal Court (ICC). Earlier, the Ministry of Internal Affairs issued a warrant for the arrest of Russian President Vladimir Putin. The Armenian authorities emphasized that they have launched the ratification process with the aim of holding Azerbaijan’s leadership accountable to the ICC for war crimes committed during the armed conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh. The Kremlin called the decision of the Armenian parliament “an incorrect step from the point of view of bilateral relations.”
• In recent months, the rhetoric in relations between Armenia and Russia has been extremely tense, the parties have made accusations against each other even at the official level. Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan harshly criticized Moscow. In particular, he said that the events of recent years have shown the “inefficiency” of security structures, which include Armenia. Obviously, we are talking about the CSTO block, in which Russia is the leading power.