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Medvedchuk stripped of citizenship; Armenia delays drills
Summary
A look back at two political moves announced on 10 January 2023, in Kyiv and in Yerevan, and what they signalled.
What did two announcements made on 10 January 2023 say about the politics around Russia's war? A retrospective on 11 January 2023 shows two separate but related stories.
In Kyiv, President Volodymyr Zelenskyy denaturalised the pro-Kremlin politician Viktor Medvedchuk and three other people, accusing them of high treason. The decision removed citizenship from a named political figure on a treason charge, and it was reported as part of the wider government reaction to the 2022 Russian invasion.
Yerevan's signal
The same day, Armenian prime minister Nikol Pashinyan said joint military exercises with the Russian Armed Forces under the Collective Security Treaty Organization would be postponed this year. He cited the organization's refusal to condemn Azerbaijan over the disputes between the two countries. The announcement was set in the context of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict and Armenia–Russia relations.
What links them
The two decisions came from different capitals and concerned different issues. One was a domestic legal step against a figure described as pro-Kremlin. The other was a postponement of exercises with Russian forces, justified by dissatisfaction with a Russia-linked security bloc. Both, however, involved relations with Moscow or its allies, and both were announced on the same day.
