Wednesday, 10 October 2007
RA Prime Minister Serzh Sargsyan received the delegation headed by Minister of National Defense of Romania Teodor Meleshkanu.
Greeting the guests, the Prime Minister noted that the Armenian-Romanian friendship was deeply rooted in history and it was not by accident that Romania was the first State to recognize the independence of the Republic Armenia. He expressed confidence that this visit of the Minister of Defense of Romania would promote the cooperation between our two countries. Serzh Sargsyan emphasized that during his several visits to Romania he had had the opportunity to get convinced in person that there was a truly warm and friendly attitude towards Armenia and the Armenian people in this country. The Armenian-Romanian relations, both bilateral and multilateral, in the opinion of the Prime Minister, were developing successfully and there were no obstacles for their further strengthening. Serzh Sargsyan noted that Armenia considered Romania as a NATO-member State as well and went on to emphasize that Armenia's cooperation with the North Atlantic alliance had been deepening over the recent period. According to the Prime Minister, here, too, the experience of Romania might be useful to Armenia. The Prime Minister further said that bilateral military and military - technical cooperation could become a good basis for the development of successful cooperation between the two countries in other spheres as well. In noting that on a return visit to Romania in the capacity of RA Minister of Defense, as early as in 2002 he happened to discuss a broad range of issues concerning the bilateral military cooperation with his Romanian counterpart, Serzh Sargsyan expressed confidence that all of the arrangements reached during these meetings would be carried out successfully.
Minister of National Defense of Romania Teodor Meleshkanu mentioned in turn that the relationship between the Armenian and Romanian peoples could be characterized as quite rich in the past and promising in the future and that today's major task was to build up a better present by deepening the cooperation in the economic, military and other spheres towards which efforts were made on either side as all pre-requisites were in place to that effect. He noted the importance of the action plan for bilateral military cooperation, signed with his Armenian colleague during this visit, which provided for the further strengthening of the legal base necessary for such cooperation, as well as streamlined the cooperation in the area of military training and so on. In the opinion of the Minister, this plan was not a finished document and was susceptible to be extended in future.
At the end of the meeting, RA Prime Minister Serzh Sargsyan noted once again that the Armenian-Romanian relations, inclusive of the military sphere, had a strong basis and good outlook for development and assured that the Government of Armenia was ready to support any initiative directed towards the deepening of this process.
