Viewing Ukraine from Armenia

BY GAREN YEGPARIAN

Prompted by the New York Times reporting that North Korea may have gotten some of its best missile technology from a factory in Ukraine, I realized there was a long-standing gap in my understanding of where that country fell in the Armenian scheme of things. So, I did a bit of reading, by no means exhaustive, which, combined with the snippets floating around in my head, resulted in what follows.

Historically, the Armenian-Ukrainian connection goes back to the times of Turkic invasions of our homeland. Not only did that trigger movement westward, resulting in the Cilician kingdom, but also northward across the Black Sea to Crimea, Ukraine, and Poland. Unfortunately, these communities ultimately assimilated and were largely lost. Of course, that wasn’t the end of Armenian migration to Ukraine. It must have continued, since today, there are anywhere between 100,000 and 350,000 Armenians in Ukraine. The lower number is from a 2001 census and includes only official residents, not temporary, migrant workers or those otherwise present. The higher figure is more recent and based on an Armenian organization’s estimate. How these figures are to be divided, with Crimea now separated from Ukraine is yet another question. Another more recent historical aspect was the cooperation between Armenians and Ukrainians in anti-Soviet efforts through the 1970s.

The upshot of so many Armenians living there is that at least two of them hold fairly high-ranking positions in government. This suggests that there’s not a strong anti-Armenian sentiment among Ukrainians. Naturally, these two are acting in the best interests of Ukraine. Yet, at least one Azeri columnist suggests writing Ukraine off as an ally of Azerbaijan because of their presence ”“ a fine example of the anti-Armenian sentiments regularly inflamed by Baku clouding judgment so much as to hurt its own interests.

This begs the question ”“ what/how are relations between Azerbaijan and Ukraine? We hear niceties being exchanged between Yerevan and Kiev, but there seems to be an underlying tension. It seems to me that a big part of the problem rises because of the relationship between Ukraine and Russia. There’s a pretty long history of conquest and antipathy between them. Thus, my guess is Kiev views much of the rest of its relationships through that prism, quite understandably ”“ you know the mindset that “the enemy of my enemy is my friend”