ArmInfo. The US desire to cancel assistance to Artsakh has no connection with relations with Armenia. Kiro Manoyan, responsible person of <Hay-Dat> office and political affairs, member of the Bureau of ARF <Dashnaktsutyun> expressed a similar opinion to ArmInfo.
The head of the Armenian National Committee of America, Aram Hamparian, announced the intention of the United States to cancel the bill adopted three months ago, according to which the United States intends to continue to provide direct financial assistance to Artsakh. The matter concerns $ 5 million annual program through USAID.
"In general, the United States has been reducing the level of assistance to a number of countries for quite a long time. Moreover, in my opinion, the reasons for a similar attitude to Artsakh should be sought in US relations with Azerbaijan. Especially recently," he stressed.
In 2018-2019 US administration increased financial assistance to Azerbaijan to $ 101.5 million. Meanwhile, in 2016-2017 this amount was $ 3 million. At the same time, there was an increase in the budget of the Azerbaijani border service from $ 90 million in 2018 to $ 116 million in 2019. At the same time, US financial support for Armenia amounted to $ 4.2 million in 2018, $ 2.8 million in 2019, another $ 2.1 million is planned for 2020.
Noting that it is not the first time the US Administration was trying to reduce or stop providing assistance to Artsakh Manoyan dismissed all the arguments sounding from Washington. According to him, Washington simply does not want to bother its partners from Baku once again. "At the same time, I didn't hear any assessment of what was happening from Yerevan. In this light, I have some doubts about existence of such an assessment. I can assume that the Armenian authorities simply do not deal with the issue of American financing of Artsakh. In my opinion, this attitude to such issues is a big mistake, "Manoyan concluded.