Author: Kajoyan Gevork

Etchmiadzin Denounces Pashinyan’s Attacks on Church at European Parliament

Kajoyan Gevork
by Contributor

 

 March 13, 2026

 

in Armenia, Featured Story, Latest, News, Top Stories

Catholicos Karekin II with the Supreme Spiritual Council of Etchmiadzin on Feb. 13


YEREVAN (Azatutyun.am)—The Armenian Apostolic Church on Friday rejected Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s new accusations voiced in the European Parliament amid his continuing attempts to depose its supreme head, Catholicos Karekin II.

Addressing the European Union’s legislative body on Wednesday, Pashinyan claimed that the church’s top clergy is leading a “party of war” that comprises Armenia’s main opposition groups and is keen to reignite the conflict with Azerbaijan. He accused it of collaborating with “foreign special services” not named by him.

The church’s Supreme Spiritual Council dismissed the allegations as “fabricated” and “unacceptable” at the end of a four-day session held in Etchmiadzin. In a statement, it said they are aimed justifying the Armenian authorities’ “illegal actions against the Church” and “further repressions” planned by them.

Pashinyan began pressuring Karekin II to resign last June shortly after the Catholicos accused Azerbaijan of committing ethnic cleansing in Nagorno-Karabakh and illegally occupying Armenian border areas during an international conference in Switzerland. Three archbishops and one bishop were arrested in the following months on different charges strongly denied by them. Three of them have been moved to house arrest in recent weeks.

Earlier this year, law-enforcement authorities also indicted Karekin II himself as well as six other clergymen. They were banned from leaving the country to attend an emergency episcopal conference held in Austria last month.

Pashinyan defended the crackdown in his speech at the European Parliament. His domestic critics say it violates Armenia’s constitution and laws guaranteeing the ancient church’s separation from the state.

Pashinyan has used different lines of attack on the church during his nearly yearlong campaign. He said until December that Karekin II and other top clerics at odds with him must go because they had secret sex affairs in breach of their vows of celibacy. He then began accusing them of spying for a foreign country, presumably Russia.

Last month, Pashinyan turned on eight prominent members of the Armenian communities in the United States and Europe who condemned his “attacks” on the church. He claimed that they want to remove the seat of the Catholicos from Armenia and seize church treasures kept in Etchmiadzin.

—

PREVIEW | Pianist Eve Egoyan Presents In Stone, A Composition Written For The

Kajoyan Gevork
Ludwig Van, Toronto
Mar 6 2026
 Anya Wassenberg
4 days ago

Canadian Armenian pianist Eve Egoyan is presenting the premiere of her piece In Stone on March 12. The concert is part of her residency as the Artist in Residence at the Jackman Humanities Institute in partnership with the Faculty of Music of the University of Toronto.

In Stone is a work for augmented acoustic piano and reflects on the Armenian Genocide that took place between 1915 and 1923. The composition was created in response to the Jackman Humanities Institute’s annual theme of Dystopia and Trust.

Armenian Genocide

The Armenian Genocide is sometimes referred to as the first genocide of the 20th century. By the spring of 1915, about 1.5 million Armenians, Christian by faith, were living in the multiethnic Ottoman Empire. Poor to WWI, the Armenians had a somewhat protected space within Ottoman Society as a minority. However, after the Ottoman Empire went through a number of military defeats, and had lost territory, during the Balkan Wars of 1912 to 1913. The setbacks turned the tide of opinion against the Armenians, who the regime saw as having closer ties to Anatolia.

The Ottoman regime sent paramilitary forces to massacre Armenians during their invasions of Russian and Persian territory in 1914. This initiative escalated in 1915, when the Ottoman authors targeted Armenian intellectuals and community leaders, arresting them, and deporting them via torturous marches through the Syrian desert. It’s estimated that between 800,000 and 1.2 million Armenians were sent on these death marches, where they were deprived of food and water, robbed, raped, and often murdered along the way. In 1916, another wave of such deportations was initiated.

Whoever survived was sent to a concentration camp.

About 100,000 to 200,000 Armenian women and children were forcibly concerted to Islam and integrated into Muslim households. About 500,000 survivors were exiled.

The 2,000 year old Armenian civilization in eastern Anatolia was wiped out, and the atrocities continued until about 1923 during the Turkish War of Independence. The genocide has never been acknowledged by Turkey, which has resulted in the distorted history for Armenian survivors and their descendants which persists to this day.

Eve Egoyan performs her composition Ghosts Beneath My Fingertips in 2021:

Eve Egoyan: The Music

Egoyan writes,

“How can I as an artist express this un-speakable past in this equally distressing present moment?
My ancestors live deeply in my soul. “In Stone” is an attempt to sing their song amidst the plethora of human songs that need to be heard in our time. Nature herself is singing loudly to us through climate change.”

Her piece In Stone looks to posit nature as a witness to the atrocities committed by humankind.

She describes the composition,

“I share my Armenian story by bringing into this composition fragments from sacred ancient Armenian hymns, pastoral and folkloric songs, and folkloric instruments. The songs and hymns are fragmented to express a feeling of both presence and loss. The meandering feeling of the compositional form echoes the wandering tradition of troubadour story-telling.”

She includes excerpts from “Zarmanali e Indz” (“It is Wonderous to me”) by 8th-century Armenian hymnographer and poet Khosrovidukht, an early composer who also happens to be a woman. Also referenced is “Havun Havun” (“To the Bird”, which refers to the Holy Ghost), one of the oldest known Armenian sacred hymns, and “Arabkir Bar” (“Arabkir Dance”), a dance from the city of Arabkir where Eve’s paternal grandfather was born.

Physical remnants of Armenians society still exist on their ancestral territory, including hand carved stones, crosses, and the ruins of stone churches. Carved inscriptions preserve the Armenian language.

“Through carved inscriptions and images they literally hold the Armenian language and artistic imagination within them, carrying our words, our prayers, our essence, held “In stone” through time past to time present and into the future.”

The stone remnants are strewn across the land, just as, she points out, diasporic Armenians are today scattered across the earth. On those ancestral lands in Western Armenia, the remains of gardens and orchards planted by Armenians also remain.

“The title of my work, In Stone, refers to stones on ancient land holding resonances of the past, the past both human and non-human. I trust in nature as witness and guardian of the truth.”

Egoyan has conducted detailed research in Yerevan, Armenia, including recording folk musicians and their instruments, such as the hvi (high wooden flute) and Blul (shepherd’s flute), Kanun (large
plucked zither instrument), Qamancha (bowed string instrument), Duduk (double-reed woodwind instrument), Santur (hammered dulcimer), and Tar (lute) to recreate the various sounds of the natural world.

She also recorded native birdsongs in the Khosrov Forest State Nature Reserve.

The Augmented Acoustic Piano

Egoyan uses an optical sensor which tracks the movement of piano keys to reveal sounds that she has recorded. It also allows her to simultaneously use a software simulation of an acoustic piano.

The combination both augments and extends the soundscape of the piano, while maintaining the physical relationship between performer and instrument.

“I consider the instrument I perform on a self-portrait,” she writes.

The augmented piano contains both her past, in the form of recorded Armenian folk instruments, present, including recent field recordings, and the future, in the form of explorative AI.

Concert Details

The free concert takes place on March 12, from 12:10 p.m. to 1:00 p.m. at Walter Hall in the University of Toronto Faculty of Music (80 Queens Park).

If you can’t make it in person, there will be a livestream available [HERE].

—

Armenpress: Armenia denies reports of new Azerbaijani military position on its

Kajoyan Gevork

Armenia22:01, 10 March 2026
Read the article in: Arabic ՀայերենRussian中文

Armenia’s Defense Ministry has denied reports circulating in media and on social platforms claiming that Azerbaijani armed forces have deployed a new military position on the sovereign territory of Armenia.

In a video released by the ministry, spokesperson Aram Torosyan said that in recent days a group of public figures and media outlets had been spreading false information alleging that Azerbaijani forces established a new position on Armenia’s sovereign territory in 2025.

Torosyan urged the public to rely only on official information and not to give in to misinformation.

Details are provided in the video released by the ministry.

Read the article in: Arabic ՀայերենRussian中文

Published by Armenpress, original at 
—

Azerbaijan resettling Azerbaijanis in formerly Armenian-inhabited villages of

Kajoyan Gevork
Panorama, Armenia
Mar 11 2026

Azerbaijan has begun actively resettling Azerbaijani citizens in villages of Artsakh (Nagorno-Karabakh) that were historically inhabited exclusively by Armenians, according to a report by the cultural heritage monitoring group Monument Watch.

The organization, which tracks the condition of Armenian cultural heritage in the region, said the policy is part of Azerbaijan’s government program known as the “great return to the territories liberated from occupation” launched in 2022.

According to the Monument Watch, the initiative envisions the return and settlement of Azerbaijani residents in what Baku describes as “liberated historical territories”. In practice, the group said the policy involves resettling Azerbaijani citizens across Nagorno-Karabakh.

The resettlement process accelerated after 2023, when Azerbaijan seized full control of Artsakh and the Armenian population left the territory following a military offensive.

The Monument Watch said Azerbaijani authorities have prioritized settlements that were historically Armenian-populated and had no Azerbaijani residents in the past, particularly in the territory of the former Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast during the Soviet era.

Between 2024 and 2025, Azerbaijanis have reportedly been resettled in several villages and towns, including in Vank, Haterk, Chapar, Kolatak, Drmbon, Horatagh and Nerkin Horatagh of the Martakert district, the town of Martuni and the villages of Karmir Shuka and Sos in the Martuni district, the town of Hadrut in the Hadrut district, as well as Aygestan, Patara, Astghashen, Khachen, Noragyugh, Khnapat, Khnatsakh and Shosh in the Askeran district.

The policy has also extended to Stepanakert, including the suburb of Krkzhan, according to the report.

The Azerbaijani authorities present the resettled residents as “displaced indigenous inhabitants,” the Monument Watch said. The monitoring group disputes this characterization, arguing that Soviet-era demographic records show that many of the villages now being resettled had no Azerbaijani population.

The group said Azerbaijani media frequently present renovated Armenian houses as newly constructed homes and portray schools, kindergartens and apartment buildings built during the Soviet period or under the Artsakh authorities as new infrastructure.

The Monument Watch also said Azerbaijani officials and media have begun assigning new Azerbaijani place names to settlements and promoting historical narratives that omit Armenian historical and cultural presence.

The group cited the historic region of Khachen, including the village of Vank, as an example where such efforts intensified in 2024.

The Monument Watch warned that the resettlement process could place Armenian cultural and historical sites at risk, including churches, monuments, cemeteries and other heritage sites located within or near the settlements.

According to the group, a monument in Vank dedicated to victims of World War II and the Artsakh liberation war has already been dismantled.

In the village of Khnatsakh, the monitoring group said monuments commemorating World War II and the Karabakh war were removed and replaced with a sign displaying the village’s newly assigned Azerbaijani name, “Xanyurdu kəndi”.

—

Macron hosts banquet in honor of visiting Armenian Prime Minister

Kajoyan Gevork

 10:10,

YEREVAN, FEBRUARY 22, ARMENPRESS. French President Emmanuel Macron and his wife Brigitte Macron have hosted an official banquet in Paris in honor of the visiting Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and his wife Anna Hakobyan.

The Armenian PM arrived in France on February 21. He held a meeting with President Macron and attended the solemn pantheonization of WWII hero Missak Manouchian. Pashinyan also met with President of the Senate Gérard Larcher.

The Armenian Prime Minister will have meetings on February 22 with Prime Minister Gabriel Attal and Paris Mayor Anne Hidalgo.

In the Caucasus, Another Year of War or Peace

Kajoyan Gevork
Carnegie Europe
Feb 13 2024
    THOMAS DE WAAL
Armenia and Azerbaijan may be nearing a bilateral peace agreement, but the threat of violence persists. A major sticking point is the Zangezur Corridor, where Baku and Moscow may pursue a deal to the detriment of Yerevan and the West.

As in Ukraine, so in the South Caucasus, 2024 will be a critical year, and one that will also test European decisionmakers.

The second half of the year will be difficult for Georgia. In October, there will be an election in which the Georgian Dream ruling party seeks to win an unprecedented fourth term and tighten its increasingly illiberal grip on the country—while still keeping its newly acquired EU candidate status.

Before that looms the issue of Azerbaijan and Armenia and whether, yet again, this is a year of war or peace. Negotiations are ongoing for a bilateral peace agreement that would normalize relations between the two countries after thirty years of conflict, but there is still the threat of violence in and around southern Armenia—in the region called Syunik, historically known as Zangezur.

On February 13, the Armenian military reported that two of its soldiers had been killed by fire from the Azerbaijani side near the village of Nerkin Hand in Syunik. It is an area close to Azerbaijan, where monitors from the EU border mission, EUMA, have previously been denied access by Russian border guards.

Azerbaijan still holds most of the cards. President Ilham Aliyev was re-elected for a fifth term as president on February 7. He has never looked so confident. Aliyev derives new legitimacy with the public from his military victory last September when his forces captured Nagorny Karabakh in a lightning operation, forcing the entire Armenian population to flee and resolving the decades-old conflict by violence.

The Karabakh operation accelerated a cooling of relations between Azerbaijan and the West, which had been trying to broker a peaceful resolution of the conflict until the last moment. This as the Armenia-Russia relationship is in a process of spectacular breakdown and the EU steps up its engagement with Armenia.

Conversely, Aliyev’s confidence derives from a double insurance policy with his two big neighbors: a tight alliance with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and a mutually advantageous partnership with Russian President Vladimir Putin. The stress on the two leaders rather than their countries is deliberate—these are very personal bonds between men who speak the same macho language of power and money.

The Western-facilitated negotiation tracks in Brussels and Washington have been suspended since last summer. What is left is a bilateral process, led by the Armenian and Azerbaijani national security advisers, working on the text of a peace agreement.

It is a serious process that delivered a good outcome on December 7, when Armenian detainees were released in return for Armenia dropping a veto on Azerbaijan hosting the COP-29 climate summit in Baku at the end of 2024.

A bilateral peace process without mediators has the advantage that no foreign agendas or egos can get in the way of a deal. But the Armenian side also fears that in a situation of asymmetry Baku can use it to impose its agenda, demanding concessions while still threatening to use force.

There are reported to be three main sticking points in reaching a deal. One is the demarcation of the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan, where multiple maps from different parts of the Soviet era give different interpretations of where lines should be drawn.

The second issue is what kind of international guarantees and dispute resolution mechanism there will be to make an agreement sustainable. The Armenians want as much international backup as possible, while the Azerbaijanis want to see very little written here.

The third issue is the highly contentious one of reopening a long-closed corridor or transit route across 43 kilometers of Armenian territory connecting the main part of Azerbaijan to its exclave of Nakhchivan, bordering Türkiye. Azerbaijan has an interest in reconnecting the two parts of its territory with routes that have as little Armenian control over them as possible. Armenia does not want to cede sovereignty or security over its strategically vital southern border area.

There is a strong Western strategic interest in the second point, and even more so in the third one—the issue of the so-called Zangezur Corridor. When it comes to security, Azerbaijan is insisting that Russian Federal Security Service (FSB) border guards should guard the rail and road connection. They cite a trilateral Armenian-Azerbaijani-Russian ceasefire statement of November 2020, which explicitly mentions this point—even though the rest of that agreement has now been rendered defunct by events. In January, Russian Foreign Minister Sergei Lavrov again insisted that this part of the deal must be enforced.

For its part, the Armenian side is working to rid itself of Russian influence, including the border guards deployed there after the fall of the Soviet Union. It would be a major strategic blow if the Russians were to stay, at the behest of Azerbaijan.

The working assumption in Armenia is that there is a deal between Baku and Moscow here, which Ankara has quietly assented to. There is at least circumstantial evidence to back this up. For the Russians, control of the transit route would be a big success. They would be formally handed control of a stretch of railway that links Russia and Iran—and routes onward to the Persian Gulf—for the first time in decades. This would be the major north-south rail route for Russia to rebuild its connections with the Middle East as war with Ukraine and contestation with the West stretch into the future.

The worrying scenario is that a peace deal will not be signed until Azerbaijan gets what it wants in southern Armenia. To put it another way, in 2024 Armenia is likely to come under big pressure from both Baku and Moscow, using different methods, to accede to a plan for the Zangezur Corridor that suits neither Yerevan nor the Western powers.

That is also why local incidents of violence, such as the one near Nerkin Hand, need to be watched very closely. New conflict and fateful consequences for the entire region could flow from small clashes like this one.

AW: Leaping over the flames on “Trndez” in Armenia

Kajoyan Gevork
 Anthony Pizzoferrato Photography, Culture, Special Reports 0

Armenians gathered on February 13 outside Saint Anna Church in Yerevan and Holy Mother of God Church in Garni to celebrate “Trndez,” a festival with ancient roots tied to Zoroastrian traditions venerating the sun and fire. 

This occasion marks the onset of spring and fertility, carrying a tapestry of folk beliefs. For newlyweds, it holds particular significance as they leap over flames, believing that if touched, they will soon be blessed with children. It has been observed that the weather traditionally begins to warm after this day.

Trndez’s history is rich, tracing back to Zoroastrian and Pagan origins, predating Armenia’s conversion to Christianity in 301 A.D. Originally named “Derendez,” it was later christened “Dyarnuntarach,” meaning “bringing forward of the Lord.” The term “Trndez” itself carries the essence of “the Lord is with you.”

Commemorations typically include church services followed by the lighting of bonfires, symbolizing divine light and warmth and the advent of spring and fertility. Participants encircle these fires, jumping over them as a ritual. “Dyarnuntarach” is intricately linked with the purification feast of the Armenian Apostolic and Catholic Churches, celebrated 40 days after the nativity. It commemorates the presentation of the Lord to the Temple by Mary and Joseph and the confirmation of Jesus’ revelation as God.

  •  Bio
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Anthony Pizzoferrato is an Italian American freelance photojournalist, documentarian and filmmaker based in Yerevan, Armenia. His work places emphasis on reporting and documenting conflicts, political events, complex social issues, human rights and cultural history within post-Soviet states and the Middle East while creating understanding, intimacy and empathy. His work on the war in Ukraine and protests in Yerevan has been published in Getty Reportage.


Central Bank of Armenia: exchange rates and prices of precious metals – 13-02-24

Kajoyan Gevork

 17:06,

YEREVAN, 13 FEBUARY, ARMENPRESS. The Central Bank of Armenia informs “Armenpress” that today, 13 February, USD exchange rate down by 0.30 drams to 404.23 drams. EUR exchange rate down by 0.48 drams to 435.48 drams. Russian Ruble exchange rate down by 0.01 drams to 4.43 drams. GBP exchange rate up by 1.44 drams to 512.04 drams.

The Central Bank has set the following prices for precious metals.

Gold price down by 127.39 drams to 26190.13 drams. Silver price up by 3.16 drams to 297.81 drams.

RFE/RL Armenian Service – 02/06/2024

Kajoyan Gevork 
                                        Tuesday, February 6, 2024


Iran Ready To Help ‘Strengthen’ Armenia, Says Envoy


Armenia - Iranian Ambassador Mehdi Sobhani speaks to journalists, January 11, 
2024.


Iran is interested in seeing Armenia strengthen its position in the region and 
ready to provide “any assistance” for that purpose, the Iranian ambassador in 
Yerevan said on Tuesday.

Mehdi Sobhani also reaffirmed Tehran’s support for the Armenian government’s 
position on transport links with Azerbaijan.

Yerevan proposed late last year a “Crossroads of Peace” project as a blueprint 
for opening the Armenian-Azerbaijani border to travel and commerce. The project 
says that Armenia and Azerbaijan should have full control of transport 
infrastructure inside each other’s territory. Iran’s Foreign Minister Hossein 
Amir-Abdollahian praised it during a December visit to the Armenian capital.

Azerbaijan effectively rejected this formula and renewed its demands for an 
extraterritorial corridor that would connect it to its Nakhichevan exclave 
through Syunik, the only Armenian region bordering Iran. Azerbaijani President 
Ilham Aliyev said in early January that people and cargo should be allowed to 
move through that corridor “without any checks.”

“We welcome and support the Crossroads of Peace project presented by Mr. 
Pashinian,” Sobhani told Armenian journalists and analysts. “That project is 
about maintaining peace and stability in the region and respecting the 
territorial integrity and sovereignty of regional countries. We consider 
Armenia’s position logical and consistent with international norms.”

“We welcome the unblocking of roads but only if that happens on the basis of the 
interests and sovereignty of the regional countries,” the envoy said in comments 
cited by the Armenpress news agency. “We support the strengthening of Armenia 
and the establishment of peace and stability. Only a balance of forces in our 
region will contribute to all that. We are ready to provide any assistance that 
Armenia will need for further development.”

Sobhani indicated Iran’s opposition to the Azerbaijani demands for the so-called 
“Zangezur corridor” backed by Turkey. The Islamic Republic will not tolerate any 
“geopolitical changes” in the South Caucasus, he said, echoing statements 
regularly made by Iranian leaders.

Kamal Kharrazi, a senior adviser to Iranian Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali 
Khamenei, also made this clear when he visited Yerevan last week. Pashinian and 
Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan praised Tehran’s stance during their talks with 
Kharrazi.

Armenia’s position on the issue has been criticized by not only Azerbaijan and 
Turkey but also Russia, its longtime ally. Russia’s Foreign Minister Sergei 
Lavrov complained on January 18 that Yerevan opposes Russian control of a 
prospective Syunik road and railway leading to Nakhichevan. Lavrov claimed that 
a Russian-brokered agreement that stopped the 2020 war in Nagorno-Karabakh calls 
for “neutral border and customs control” there. Armenian leaders deny this.




‘No Decision Yet’ On Armenian Independence Declaration

        • Ruzanna Stepanian
        • Karlen Aslanian

Armenia - A copy of the 1990 Declaration of Independence.


Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s political team has not yet made a final 
decision on whether to try to remove from Armenia’s constitution any reference 
to a 1990 declaration of independence resented by Azerbaijan, a senior lawmaker 
said on Tuesday.

“I want to make clear that we do not have a final conclusion,” Hayk Konjorian, 
the parliamentary leader of Pashinian’s Civil Contract party, told reporters. 
“It’s still too early to make a final conclusion and raise questions from that 
standpoint.”

Konjorian at the same time stressed: “We must not regard any text as sacrosanct.”

The declaration in turn refers to a 1989 unification act adopted by the 
legislative bodies of Soviet Armenia and the then Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous 
Oblast and calls for international recognition of the 1915 Armenian genocide. It 
is cited in a preamble to the current Armenian constitution adopted in 1995.

Pashinian again criticized the declaration last week, claiming that Armenia 
“will never have peace” with Azerbaijan as long as it is mentioned by the 
constitution. Accordingly, he defended his plans to try to enact a new 
constitution that would presumably make no such reference.

Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev said on February 1 that Armenia should remove 
that reference and amend other documents “infringing on Azerbaijan’s territorial 
integrity” if it wants to make peace with his country. Armenian opposition 
leaders portrayed Aliyev’s statement as further proof that Pashinian wants to 
effectively declare the 1990 declaration null and void under pressure from 
Azerbaijan as well as Turkey.

Armenia - Opposition deputy Artur Khachatrian speaks in the Armenian parliament, 
Yerevan, February 6, 2024.

“Aliyev and Pashinian almost simultaneously … presented the same demands to the 
people of Armenia,” one of them, Artur Khachatrian, told RFE/RL’s Armenian 
Service. “It is obvious that Aliyev is thus forcing Pashinian to make 
concessions.”

Konjorian denied that Pashinian wants to change the constitution at the behest 
of Aliyev. Pashinian sounded less categorical on this score in a reportedly 
pre-recorded radio interview broadcast on February 1.

Khachatrian is one of several lawmakers from the main opposition Hayastan 
alliance who have been allowed by the Armenian Foreign Ministry to see in recent 
weeks written proposals regarding an Armenian-Azerbaijani peace treaty exchanged 
by Yerevan and Baku. In a joint statement issued on February 2, the lawmakers 
insisted that the Azerbaijani terms of the treaty are extremely unfavorable for 
the Armenian side.

“I stand by our assertion that the country which presented such proposals to us 
has no desire or intention to sign a peace treaty with us,” Khachatrian insisted 
on Tuesday.

Edmon Marukian, an Armenian ambassador-at-large and political ally of Pashinian, 
likewise charged on February 2 that Baku is not serious about signing the peace 
deal. He said Aliyev’s demands for the constitutional change in Armenia amount 
to a “new precondition.”




Armenia’s Ruling Party To Plead For Release Of Tech CEO

        • Shoghik Galstian

Armenia - Speaker Alen Simonian (left) chairs a session of the Armenian 
parliament, Yerevan, February 6, 2024.


Lawmakers representing Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s Civil Contract party 
have decided to ask authorities to release the founder and two current and 
former employees of a major Armenian software company arrested last week on 
corruption charges.

Ashot Hovanesian of the U.S.-registered company Synergy International Systems, 
senior company executive Lili Mkrian and her former colleague Ani Gevorgian were 
indicted in a criminal investigation into what law-enforcement authorities call 
a fraudulent procurement tender organized by the Armenian Ministry of Economy 
last summer.

The tender was invalidated by an Armenian court shortly after being won by 
Synergy. Investigators say the ministry illegally disqualified another 
information technology firm that submitted a much smaller bid. Four ministry 
officials were also detained last week. But unlike Hovanesian, Mkrian and 
Gevorgian, they were set free or moved to house arrest in the following days.

Synergy on Monday rejected the still unpublicized accusations leveled against 
the remaining detainees and demanded their immediate release. The Armenian Union 
of Advanced Technology Enterprises (UATE) also condemned Hovanesian’s arrest 
over the weekend. It said that recent “unfounded” detentions of “business 
representatives and other prominent persons” are turning Armenia into a “risky 
country” for local and foreign tech entrepreneurs.

Hayk Konjorian, the leader of Civil Contract’s party parliamentary group, 
announced on Tuesday that it met late on Monday and decided to petition a court 
to free the Synergy executives pending investigation. He said the pro-government 
parliamentarians will guarantee the suspects’ proper behavior in writing.

Armenia - Deputies from the ruling Civil Contract party attend a session of the 
National Assembly, Yerevan, March 21, 2023.

Konjorian insisted that the decision was not ordered by or coordinated with 
Pashinian. It reflects public reactions to the arrests, rather than the fact 
that one of the suspects, Gevorgian, is the wife of parliament speaker Alen 
Simonian’s brother, he told journalists. He said the pro-government 
parliamentarians also took into account the fact that Gevorgian and Mkrian have 
young children.

One of those deputies, Emma Palian, expressed confidence that Simonian’s 
sister-in-law will be cleared of any wrongdoing.

“Knowing personally Mr. Simonian but not Ms. Gevorgian, I am sure it will emerge 
that the case is baseless and the result of a misunderstanding,” said Palian.

The speaker, who is a senior member of the ruling party, himself has not 
commented on the case so far. But he did make a point of posting on Facebook a 
photo of himself, his brother and Gevorgian right after her arrest.

The fact that one of the detainees is related to Simonian has fueled speculation 
about political motives behind the high-profile case. Some commentators claim 
that Pashinian personally sanctioned the young woman’s arrest in a bid to boost 
his falling approval ratings by showing Armenians that he is serious about 
combatting corruption. Pashinian allies have dismissed such claims.



Reposted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2024 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.

Asbarez: Speaker’s Call to Change National Anthem Sparks Opposition Accusations of Concessions to Turkey and Azerbaijan

Kajoyan Gevork
by Asbarez Staff

 

 

 

in Armenia, Artsakh, Featured Story, Latest, News, Top Stories

Another irresponsible remark from Parliament Speaker Alen Simonyan, this time about an imperative to change Armenia’s National Anthem and Coat of Arms, has led opposition leaders to accuse Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and his party of making concessions to Turkey and Azerbaijan.

In a rant on his Telegram social media channel, Simonyan said “Mer Hairenik,” Armenia’s National Anthem, is “foreign” and has no connection “with our state and Armenian music,” calling for a national song that is “Armenian.”

The words to “Mer Hairenik” were written by Mikael Nalbandian and the score was arranged by the famous Armenian composer, Barsegh Ganachian. The song was adopted as Armenia’s National Anthem during the 1918 republic, with an iteration being approved in 1991 as the anthem for the present-day Armenian Republic.

Simonyan then went on to mock Armenia’s Coat of Arms, calling the lion depicted on a shied “a Facebook smiley face.” He apparently also took issue with Mount Ararat depicted in the center of the emblem, saying that Armenia was “under water.” He added that the sword, “should not be chained,” whereas the sword depicted in the emblem is surrounded by wheat stalks that symbolize abundance.

Naturally, a spokesperson for Simonyan later said that the Parliament Speaker was expressing his own views on the matter — a now common situation that has landed Yerevan in diplomatic and social hot waters in the past.

Reacting to Simonian’s comments, opposition lawmakers claimed that Pashinyan’s government is planning to change the state symbols in order to placate Ankara and Baku.

“This is another demand of the Turkish-Azerbaijani duo,” said Gegham Manukyan a member of the opposition Hayastan alliance. He explained that Turkey and Azerbaijan are attempting to force Yerevan to erase all references of Armenia’s millennia-old history.

“They [Ankara and Baku] need a small state which is detached from its roots and with which they could do anything they want,” added Manukyan.

Simonyan’s rant comes at a time when Baku is challenging Armenia’s Constitution, vocally claiming that it had raised objections to the document at the onset of peace talks with Yerevan. Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan last week acknowledged last week that Baku has voiced reservations about the Constitution’s preamble, which references Armenia’s Declaration of Independence that calls for the unification of Armenia and Artsakh.

Pashinyan himself criticized the Declaration of Independence, saying it sows conflict, and earlier this month called for a new constitution that better reflects the current geopolitical realities in the region.

Pashinyan has also criticized the Armenia’s Coat of Arms, saying last year that it emphasizes a “dichotomy between historical Armenia and real Armenia.”