Yerevan: A court in Armenia sentenced the Archbishop of Shirak, Mikael Ajapahian, to two years in prison on Friday, amid a conflict between the state and critical church representatives. He was accused of making public calls for a takeover of power, according to local media reports, though Ajapahian reportedly denied the allegations.
According to Ghana News Agency, the reports said the archbishop was arrested at the end of June. That same month, security authorities also arrested the politically influential Archbishop of Tavush, Bagrat Galstanyan, on charges of an attempted coup. The opposition viewed the actions at the time as an attempt to silence critics of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
Pashinyan has been under political pressure since Armenia’s defeat in a war with Azerbaijan over the disputed region of Nagorno-Karabakh. There have been repeated mass protests against him, and nationalist circles in particular are furious with Pashinyan. Several leading figures in the Armenian Orthodox Church have emerged as leaders of the protests against Pashinyan.
In the autumn of 2023, Armenia lost control over the conflict region of Nagorno-Karabakh during an attack by Azerbaijan. After the attacks, more than 100,000 Karabakh Armenians fled, many of them to Armenia. After months of negotiations, Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed a peace agreement in August in the presence of US President Donald Trump.