Armenia’s Arrest Order for Senior Priest Sparks Clashes

Report by “Safarti Tarjuman” International News Desk

YEREVAN — A new arrest order for a senior Armenian clergyman accused of plotting to overthrow the government triggered heated scuffles outside one of the country’s most revered churches on Friday, Armenian media reported.

Footage circulating on local news sites showed security forces pushing through crowds outside the headquarters of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Etchmiadzin, near the capital Yerevan, as they attempted to take Archbishop Mikael Ajapahyan into custody.

The officers eventually withdrew from the cathedral area after Ajapahyan agreed to engage in discussions with officials from the Armenian Investigative Committee. A court is expected to decide soon whether the archbishop will remain in detention.

The dramatic confrontation comes just two days after another senior cleric, Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, was detained on similar allegations, escalating a standoff between the church and Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s administration.

Galstanyan, along with 13 others, faces charges of plotting to topple the government. Both archbishops have rejected the accusations, maintaining their innocence.

The Armenian Apostolic Church strongly condemned Friday’s events, describing them as a stain on the nation’s modern history. In a statement, the church called the actions of the authorities “shameful” and denounced what it saw as state aggression against a centuries-old religious institution.

Prime Minister Pashinyan, who faces re-election next year, alleged earlier this week that security forces had disrupted what he described as a “large and sinister plan by the criminal-oligarchic clergy” to seize power in the South Caucasus nation.

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