A confrontation between Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Armenia’s high Christian clerics appears to be deepening, polarising the deeply spiritual South Caucasus nation of three million.
St Echmiadzin, the Armenian Apostolic Church’s headquarters, has been “taken over by the anti-Christian, immoral, antinational and antistate group and needs to be liberated”, Pashinyan wrote on Fb on Tuesday, including: “I’ll lead this liberation.”
The dispute escalated late final month, with bells ringing tocsin over St Echmiadzin on June 27.
Normally, the loud and alarming sound alerts an occasion of significance, corresponding to a overseas invasion.
However on that parching-hot June day, the noise rang out to sign the detention of a high cleric who, based on Pashinyan, was a part of a “criminal-oligarchic clergy” that was concerned in “terrorism” and plotted a “coup”.
He mentioned the “coup organisers” embody the Church’s head, Karekin II, who has disputed with Pashinyan in a months-long private feud.
However the battle shouldn’t be seen as a confrontation between secular authorities and the whole Church, observers mentioned.
“It’s a private conflict,” Richard Giragosian of the Regional Research Heart suppose tank based mostly within the Armenian capital, Yerevan, advised Al Jazeera.
However some Armenians nonetheless described the furore in virtually apocalyptic phrases.
“We misplaced our statehood so many occasions, so being a part of the Church was equal to being Armenian,” Narine Malikyan, a 37-year-old mom of two from Armenia’s second-largest metropolis of Guymri, advised Al Jazeera. “Attacking the Church is like attacking each Armenian.”
The Church, whose doctrine differs from that of the Roman Catholic and Orthodox sees, has for hundreds of years helped preserve the identification of Armenians whereas their lands have been dominated by Iranians, Byzantines, Arabs, Mongols, Turks and Russians.
‘The Karabakh clan’
The battle between Pashinyan and Karekin is rooted within the 2020 conflict between Armenia and Azerbaijan that ended a decades-old “frozen battle”.
Within the early Nineteen Nineties, Nagorno-Karabakh, a mountainous Azeri enclave dominated by ethnic Armenians, broke away in a bloody conflict that uprooted as much as 1,000,000.
Moscow-backed separatist leaders from Nagorno-Karabakh turned a part of Armenia’s political elite and cultivated ties with the Church.
The so-called “Karabakh clan” spawned two presidents who dominated Armenia for 20 years however have been accused of corruption, cronyism and pocketing donations from Armenian diasporas in France, the US and Russia.
In 2018, Pashinyan, an ex-lawmaker and widespread publicist, led big protests that toppled the “Karabakh clan”. He turned prime minister with approval rankings of greater than 80 p.c.
Some protesters again then flocked to St Echmiadzin to induce Karekin to step down as they lambasted his penchant for luxurious vehicles and lavish events.
‘An illegitimate little one’
Two years later, Armenia misplaced Nagorno-Karabakh in a 44-day conflict that proved the prevalence of drone assaults and hi-tech stratagems.
By 2023, Azerbaijan regained management of the whole Dubai-sized territory, whereas tens of hundreds of its residents flocked to Armenia.
Karekin blamed Pashinyan for the defeat, although observers have argued that the accountability lies together with his predecessors’s miscalculations.
Pashinyan struck again.
He claimed that 73-year-old Karekin – who was ordained in 1970, studied theology in Austria, Germany and Moscow and have become the Church’s head in 1999, broke his vow of celibacy to father a baby – and may, subsequently, vacate his seat.
“If Karekin II tries to denounce this truth, I’ll show it in all crucial methods,” Pashinyan wrote on Fb on June 9.
He didn’t specify the main points, however Armenian media “found” that Karekin’s alleged daughter is a medical physician in Yerevan.
Karekin didn’t reply to the declare however accused Pashinyan of dividing Armenians.
“The anti-clerical marketing campaign unleashed by authorities is a critical risk to our nationwide unity, home stability and is a direct blow to our statehood,” the grey-bearded clergyman, clad in a ceremonial gown adorned with crosses, mentioned on June 22 at a ceremony at St Echmiadzin.
A day later, a priest known as Pashinyan “Judas” and claimed he was circumcised.
Pashinyan retorted by providing to reveal himself to the priest and Karekin.
A failed detention
On June 27, dozens of intelligence officers interrupted a convention in one in all St Echmiadzin’s tawny, centuries-old buildings to forcibly ship one other Pashinyan critic, Archbishop Mikael Adjapakhyan, to an interrogation.
However monks and parishioners summoned by the tocsin fought them off – whereas critics in contrast the incident to the 1938 killing of Armenia’s high cleric in St Echmiadzin in the course of the Soviet-era crackdown on faith.
Hours later, Archbishop Adjapakhyan volunteered for an interrogation, telling supporters that he “was being persecuted illegally”.
He was arrested for 2 months – together with 14 alleged “coup organisers,” together with one other archbishop, Bagrat Galstanyan, opposition lawmakers and “Karabakh clan” figures.
The coup was speculated to happen on September 21, on Armenia’s Independence Day, based on its plan leaked to the Civic.am each day.
Additionally arrested was development tycoon Samvel Karapetyan, who made his estimated $3.6bn fortune in Russia and owns Armenia’s fundamental energy firm.
Karapetyan had threatened Pashinyan, saying if the battle with Karekin is just not solved, “we’ll participate in all of it in our personal approach.”
The arrests have been “a transfer by the Armenian authorities to preempt any potential Russian interference within the coming [parliamentary] elections which might be set for June 2026”, analyst Giragosian mentioned.
‘Pashinyan is difficult to barter with’
These against Pashinyan’s Civil Contract Get together have accused him of siding with Azerbaijan and Turkiye.
However Baku has its qualms about Pashinyan.
“Pashinyan is by far not a peace dove,” Emil Mustafayev, chief editor of the Minval Politika journal based mostly within the Azeri capital, Baku, advised Al Jazeera. “He’s onerous to barter with.”
Nonetheless, after the lack of Nagorno-Karabakh, Pashinyan “started to take heed of Baku’s place”, Mustafayev mentioned. “Of all doable choices in Yerevan, he’s the least problematic companion one can have a dialogue with, regardless of how difficult it’s.”
Analyst Gigarosyan agreed.
“Pashinyan is one of the best interlocutor [Baku and Ankara] might hope for due to predictability and in addition as a result of he’s seeking to flip the web page,” he mentioned. “He’s not on the lookout for revenge.”
And although Pashinyan’s present approval rankings are properly under 20 p.c, his get together might develop into a political phoenix and win the June 2026 vote.
Armenian opposition events are both centred round two former presidents from the “Karabakh clan” who’re deeply mistrusted, or are too small and splintered to type sizeable coalitions and affect decision-making within the unicameral, 107-seat parliament.
“They’re more likely to win,” Giragosian mentioned of Pashinyan’s get together. “Not due to a powerful diploma of assist, however as a result of the opposition is hated and feared extra.”
