The West's sanctions against Russia concern the fields of energy, technologies and finances and cannot but affect the Armenian economy, well-known Armenian economist, professor Tatul Manaseryan told ArmInfo on Wednesday.
He said that the Armenian economy strongly depends on Russia's transfers and energy. "Each year our joint projects are supposed to become more and more science intensive and to transit from extraction to processing, which will become impossible without western technologies. The sanctions will also affect Armenia's financial market as many projects in our country are financed by banks with Russian capital," Manaseryan said.
According to the expert, on the one hand, western investments may ebb from Armenia in the coming years, but on the other hand, if Armenia joins the Customs Union and then the Eurasian Economic Union, it will get access to new sales markets and will become much more attractive for investors. "The key task for Armenia today is to diversify its foreign economic ties – its exports and investments flows. Heavy dependence on one country – even if it is a strategic partner – is fraught with serious risks. In the last years the Armenian economy has been diversified a bit, but this has been done not by the government but by individual businessmen who keep searching for new markets," Manaseryan said.