CSTO strips Armenia of voting rights at Moscow summit as five members agree aviation pact

Armenia lost its voting rights and the ability to nominate candidates for senior positions at the Collective Security Treaty Organization after the bloc's November 11, 2026 summit in Moscow, where the five remaining members — Russia, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan and Belarus — stripped Yerevan of those rights over unpaid membership dues.

CSTO Secretary-General Taalatbek Masadykov said the organization was not considering expelling Armenia. Yerevan froze its participation in the CSTO in February 2024, accusing its allies of failing to ensure Armenia's security during armed clashes with Azerbaijan. Armenia has stopped paying dues and sending representatives to CSTO bodies, but Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said on November 5 that the country was not preparing to leave the Eurasian Economic Union.

Kazakh political analyst Maksim Kaznacheyev told The Times of Central Asia that Armenia's domestic politics explain the reluctance to formally withdraw. According to Kaznacheyev, "pro-Western actions could trigger an internal crisis and destabilise the country" if Armenia leaves the CSTO or the EAEU. He contrasted the situation with Uzbekistan, which left and rejoined the CSTO on separate occasions but had a unified political elite when it did so, and also held a bilateral security agreement with Russia allowing military cooperation outside the bloc.

At the same summit, the five active members agreed to develop the CSTO's Collective Aviation Forces and approved plans for mobile air defence units to protect joint military formations, including combat aviation units alongside transport and special-purpose aircraft. Kaznacheyev said the agreements could expand Russian military-technical assistance to Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Tajikistan, though he stressed the agreements did not in themselves mean deliveries of missile systems or aviation technology transfers had begun.

The summit's final declaration also expressed concern about attacks on commercial vessels and port infrastructure involving uncrewed systems, including in the Caspian Sea. Kaznacheyev said no separate CSTO forces were needed there, as existing cooperation arrangements among Caspian littoral states could address the main security challenges.