The need to face the geo-economic challenges dictates the importance of being involved in international transit hubs. This need is particularly evident in the case of landlocked Armenia, which has been subjected to a long-term blockade by neighboring countries. Especially when Turkey and Azerbaijan have been using all their diplomatic and resource potential for decades to completely isolate Armenia, restraining the possibilities of ensuring development and economic growth in the country.

In the context of the paper, the permissive and extremely tolerant attitude of the civilized world to the arrogant and wild actions and war crimes of Azerbaijan in the framework of the Artsakh-Azerbaijani war of 2020 and beyond was discussed. Drawing parallels with the same civilized world's reverse attitude to the Russo-Ukrainian war of 2022 and the insane obsession with “punishing” Russia with sanctions reveals the use of double standards. Studies have shown that the "silence" of the civilized world in relation to Azerbaijani aggression is based on "weighty" economic interests, starting from the aspirations to replace Russian energy resources with Azerbaijani ones, to the share participation in the Azerbaijani oil and gas infrastructures and obtaining the exclusive right to exploit the Nagorno Karabakh mines.

Significant differences in tax policy, banking and financial secrecy and similar issues have led to colossal accumulation of financial resources and tax abuses in a number of countries/jurisdictions around the world. Such countries/jurisdictions are characterized as «tax havens». However, if such territories provide «paradise» conditions for the business sector, which strives in every way to reduce the tax burden, then for states deprived of a significant part of the expected tax revenues, they are a real «hell». Perhaps, this is the reason for the universal interest in tax havens and offshores. The paper compiles and analyzes «black» and «gray» lists of countries/jurisdictions that have received the status of tax havens by various international structures, and their classification according to the indices of financial secrecy and corporate tax havens.

Recently, sanctions have become a unique tool for regulating foreign relations and forcibly limiting the economic opportunities of other countries. In this regard, 2022 is an unprecedented year in terms of scope, coverage and scalability of sanctions. Although the practice of imposing sanctions is accompanied by “noise and shout” of humanism and pacifism, their main motivation is “political expediency”. The latter is justified by the use of double standards when imposing sanctions on a particular country that exhibits similar behavior. Based on the well-known Russian-Ukrainian events of 2022, the West “flooded” Russia with a stream of sanctions. As of November 9, the US, Canada, Switzerland, EU, UK, France, Australia and Japan have imposed a total of 12,747 sanctions against Russia. The sanctions packages also include a ban on imports from Russia of a number of vital resources that are, in fact, critical to the economy of the sanctioners themselves. In such circumstances, it is still difficult to clearly assess which of the parties will be more deeply "mired" in losses as a result of all this.

In general, it is accepted that mutually beneficial economic relations are the best prescription for solving any conflict. At first glance, the Armenian-Turkish relations should also be considered within the framework of the same logic, but everything is not so clearcut... The recent history of relations between Turkey and Armenia began in 1991 after the collapse of the USSR and the declaration of independence of the Republic of Armenia. In 1991 on December 16, Turkey recognized the independence of Armenia, but the countries have not established diplomatic relations until now. At the root of the hostile sentiments between Armenia and Turkey are the well-known historical facts: the denial of the Armenian Genocide of 1915, the occupation of Armenian historical territories, as well as the closing of the border in the interest of a third country, Azerbaijan. Nevertheless, the Armenian-Turkish trade never stopped during the blockade. At the same time, it's no secret that the actual volume of Turkish-Armenian trade is uncontrollable, because most of it is carried out indirectly through the mediation of third countries. Turkey keeps Armenia in a blockade and closes the entry of Armenian goods to the Turkish markets, that is, not only the border is closed, but also the entry of Armenian goods to the market, instead, it does not cause any problems when importing Turkish goods to Armenia through the territory of Georgia.