June 18, 2004 - 18:42 AMT
ROBERT KOCHARIAN: POLITICAL BENEFITS IN REGION SHOULD BE REPLACED BY DURABLE INTERESTS AND COMMON SENSE
The economy of Armenia, as those of the majority of the countries of the Eurasian region, is at the stage of dynamic and sustainable economic growth, Armenian President Robert Kocharian stated at Eurasian Integration: Contemporary Development Trends and Globalization Challenges international forum in the Kazakh capital of Astana. In his words, within the past three years the economic growth rate in Armenia made 12% - «we just came close to the level of the economy of the 80-s of the past century.» All this lets set qualitatively new goals and integration of infrastructures is necessary to realize them, the Armenian leader said, specially accentuating energy and transport communications. However, in his words, subjective approaches often influence the integration processes. R. Kocharian said he was confident that «the momentary gain or political benefits should be replaced with long-term interests and simple common sense.» «The availability of conflicts in the South Caucasian region brakes the development of both the region as a whole and its countries. Being convinced advocates of regional cooperation, we consider that the intensification of integration processes will much contribute to regional security, stability and settlement of the conflicts available,» the Armenian leader summed up when addressing the EurAsEC forum.