Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has taken a one-day leave on June 12, his office announced.

A severe hailstorm that struck Shirak Province on June 10 caused extensive damage to agricultural land in the Akhuryan municipality.

Local authorities are currently assessing and documenting the losses.

According to Akhuryan municipal officials, wheat and barley fields in 14 villages within the municipality were affected by the hailstorm. In some villages, strong winds accompanying the storm also damaged the roofs of homes and shattered windows.

Akhuryan Mayor Zaven Manukyan, together with staff from the municipality’s Agriculture and Environmental Protection Department, visited the affected settlements to inspect the damage.

For uninsured farmland, municipal specialists will evaluate the extent of the damage, prepare official reports, and submit them to the government for consideration. 

The assessment process is ongoing. The Shirak Regional Commission, working in cooperation with local community commissions, will review all reported incidents, conduct field inspections, and determine the full extent of the damage. Separate assessments will also be carried out to evaluate losses affecting agricultural land and crops.

Following heavy rainfall on June 11, the Aparan Reservoir reached 100% capacity, and the water level of Lake Sevan rose by 2 cm within a few hours, according to meteorologists.

“Yesterday’s heavy rainfall left its mark on water resources. The Aparan Reservoir is filled to 100%, and the water level of Lake Sevan has risen by 2 cm compared with the previous day,” Levon Azizyan, Director of the Hydrometeorology and Monitoring Center, said in a social media statement.

Due to abundant precipitation recorded in 2025 and 2026, high storage levels have been observed in all major reservoirs in Armenia, creating favorable conditions for water resource management, according to officials.

Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure David Khudatyan briefed lawmakers on the matter during a joint committee session on the 2025 budget report.

“Due to precipitation in 2025 and 2026, all major reservoirs in the republic have reached near-full capacity. In some places, we have already carried out water releases due to overflow beyond capacity,” the minister said.

The minister also spoke about the Vedi Reservoir, noting that preparatory works for its operation are ongoing. He said that the processes of filling and water release of the reservoir are being carried out in stages to ensure the necessary strength of the dam and reservoir bed.

The Vedi Reservoir is the largest in Armenia, and its construction was completed in early 2025. The first phase of filling began officially in April 2025.

“We are managing this process of phased filling and emptying so that the dam and the reservoir bed can reach the required level of strength needed for full-capacity filling,” Khudatyan said, adding that the process is a routine technological requirement.

Referring to the Kaps Reservoir construction project, the minister said that development works are continuing. Following the termination of the contract with the Chinese contractor, a new design is being developed that envisions a reservoir capacity approximately 2.5 times larger than the previous version.

Construction of the Kaps Reservoir on the Akhuryan River in Shirak Province is currently suspended, as in December 2025 the Armenian government initiated the process of terminating the contract with the Chinese company Shanxi Construction Investment Group due to failure to fulfill contractual obligations and delays in work execution.

Meteorologists previously said that following heavy rainfall on June 11, the Aparan Reservoir reached 100% capacity, and the water level of Lake Sevan rose by 2 cm within a few hours.

Most weather-related road damage in Yerevan has been repaired, according to Mayor Tigran Avinyan.

“Weather conditions in Yerevan have set records over the past 20 years in terms of precipitation and temperature fluctuations, which has mainly led to various issues on road sections,” Avinyan told Members of Parliament during a 2025 budget report discussion at a joint committee hearing.

The mayor noted that the majority of these problems have already been addressed.

“I can say that they have already been resolved by about 95 percent,” he said.

Avinyan also emphasized that in sections where the Yerevan City Hall carried out road repairs or pothole patching, road quality has been maintained.

UK Deputy Ambassador to the OSCE James Ford has welcomed ODIHR’s preliminary findings that Armenia’s parliamentary elections were orderly and professionally conducted, congratulated Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, and affirmed UK support for strengthening democratic resilience.

“I thank our Armenian colleagues for their update on the outcome of Armenia’s parliamentary elections. The United Kingdom welcomes ODIHR’s preliminary findings, which note that election day was orderly and professionally conducted, with voting largely proceeding smoothly across polling stations. We commend Armenia’s Central Electoral Commission for administering the elections, and congratulate Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan on his victory,” Ford said in a statement to the OSCE.

“The UK values ODIHR’s important role in offering independent assessments of electoral processes and was proud to be among the 42 participating States that contributed observers to the mission in Armenia. We remain committed to supporting Armenia to strengthen its democratic resilience and trust that the authorities will engage constructively in addressing the areas identified by ODIHR for further strengthening electoral integrity for future elections. The UK looks forward to working with the new, democratically elected Armenian government to deliver on our Strategic Partnership, strengthen regional stability and develop closer relations with European partners,” he added. 

Yerevan City Hall is planning to impose “restrictions” on passenger vehicles, alongside the expansion of dedicated public transport lanes, in an effort to address traffic congestion in the Armenian capital.

The traffic problem in Yerevan had reached a point where Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan declared it a crisis in 2025 and urged officials to set up a task force to address it.

Yerevan Mayor Tigran Avinyan briefed lawmakers on the city’s traffic management at a joint committee hearing on the 2025 budget report.

“Regarding Yerevan’s traffic congestion, the Yerevan City Hall has created a specialized institution — the Traffic Management Center — which has been staffed with appropriate professionals,” Avinyan said.

A pilot program is currently analyzing vehicle flows into the city.

“Based on all these calculations, a program of changes will be presented to us this year on what needs to be done,” he said.

Mayor Avinyan said the main cause of traffic congestion in Yerevan is the economic growth recorded in recent years, which has led to a sharp increase in the number of passenger vehicles.

“The first and main reason is economic growth, which has led to a massive increase in the number of passenger cars,” the mayor said.

Even the continued development of public transport is not sufficient to solve the congestion problem on its own, the mayor warned.

“Public transport cannot operate according to its schedule if we do not have restrictions on passenger cars,” Avinyan emphasized.

The mayor said that Yerevan plans to adopt approaches used in European cities.

“Certain restrictions must definitely be introduced for passenger cars, and they must be replaced with dedicated public transport lanes,” he said.

Avinyan added that, based on ongoing studies, locations for parking facilities, traffic management mechanisms, and restrictions on private transport will be determined.

He also noted that preliminary results are expected in September–October 2026, while practical implementation of the program is planned to begin in 2027.

Prosperous Armenia Party president Gagik Tsarukyan vowed to “protect by all lawful means” the votes his party received in the parliamentary elections on June 7.

In a statement on Friday, Tsarukyan said his party will start political consultations with other political forces to this end.

The Prosperous Armenia Party received 3.996% votes, just below the 4% threshold required to enter parliament. The final results will be published by the electoral commission (CEC) on June 14 amid a recount. The electoral body declared all results at two specific polling stations invalid, citing procedural flaws, but Tsarukyan alleged that this was an orchestrated move in order to prevent his party from entering parliament during the recount.

“When there was no longer any doubt that the Prosperous Armenia Party had secured seats in parliament, the authorities decided to resort to blatant destruction. Late at night, a covert CEC meeting was held, during which the results of two polling stations were annulled without scheduling a repeat vote, as required by the Electoral Code.

It is clear that the results were annulled precisely in those polling stations where Prosperous Armenia Party received a large number of votes. At the same time, the results of polling stations where invalidating Prosperous Armenia Party votes would not have affected the election outcome were not annulled,” Tsarukyan said.

“This is no longer just an issue for the Prosperous Armenia Party; it concerns the entire post-election developments in Armenia, all of us. Our team will be actively working today and in the coming days, in cooperation with all our opposition partners. I thank all political forces, public figures, and media outlets that have expressed support for us since last night,” Gagik Tsarukyan said.

Elections held in Armenia on June 7 were free, fair, and transparent, according to Internal Affairs Minister Arpine Sargsyan.

“I want to reiterate that free, fair, and transparent elections were held in the Republic of Armenia. Our Electoral Code provides all political forces with the necessary tools to monitor the entire process and ensure that electoral procedures are properly organized. At polling stations, political forces have proxies, there are observers, and there are live broadcasts from polling stations through video surveillance systems,” Sargsyan told reporters at a press briefing.

She emphasized that, at least so far, she has not seen any documented, evidence-based, and legally valid report from any political force indicating significant violations.

Sargsyan further explained that various political forces have made different claims about alleged violations during the elections, which have also been circulated by social media users. However, when the Ministry of Internal Affairs asks these users to file official reports of crimes, they respond that they have merely reshared political statements and have no evidence.

“We will continue our monitoring in full scope, and if there are issues that require a response, we will respond accordingly,” the minister stressed.

Samvel Karapetyan’s Strong Armenia Alliance, which came in second in the parliamentary elections held on June 7 with 23.2% of the vote, submitted a request on Friday to the Central Electoral Commission (CEC) demanding that the results of the parliamentary elections be declared invalid.

The application was submitted to the CEC by Aram Vardevanyan, a parliamentary candidate from the Strong Armenia Alliance.

Vardevanyan told reporters outside the CEC headquarters that their submission includes what he described as “all large-scale electoral violations” that took place both during the voting and prior to election day.

“I think many have been following what is happening in Armenia in the context of post-election processes. What is currently happening should not take place in a democratic society,” Vardevanyan said.