MOSCOW (Reuters) – Armenia’s government says the dismissal of an army general came amid a political crisis on Wednesday, almost two weeks after Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan fired him and accused the army of a coup attempt. has.
The military demanded that Pashinyan resign on February 25, prompting Pashinyan to fire the chief of staff’s general staff. But this step needs the approval of the president, which he did not want to give.
The standoff is a major challenge for Pashinyan, who was swept away in 2018 by protest marches but was under fire over his handling of the conflict last year between ethnic Armenians and Azerbaijan over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
The government of Pashinyan said in a statement on Wednesday that the dismissal of the general is now legally in force because the president did not sign the decision within the allotted time or went to court under specific articles of the law.
“Chief of General Staff Onik Gasparyan will be legally dismissed from his post on March 10,” the statement said.
In a statement, Gasparyan denied his dismissal as unconstitutional, saying Armenia’s political crisis could only be ended by the resignation of Pashinyan and the parliamentary election, the Interfax news agency reported.
“I will continue to serve the motherland and the Armenian people in a different capacity,” he said, without elaborating.
Another statement attributed to the leadership of the army said it was in line with Gasparyan’s statement and his general assessment of the situation, News.am and Russian media reported.
“There is one solution to the current situation, that is in the message (from Gasparyan),” the statement was quoted as saying.
Pashinyan later suggested that Artak Davtyan, the former chief of staff, should replace Gasparyan, the TASS news agency reported.
Pashinyan has been facing resignation since last November when he agreed to a ceasefire mediated by Russia, which halted six weeks of fighting between ethnic Armenian and Azeri forces over the Nagorno-Karabakh region.
The agreement ensured significant territorial gains for Azerbaijan in and around Nagorno-Karabakh. The enclave is internationally recognized as part of Azerbaijan, but is populated and until recently was completely controlled by ethnic Armenians.
Pashinyan, who turned down calls for resignation, said he was obliged to agree to the peace deal to prevent greater human and territorial losses.
(Reporting by Maria Kiselyova and Gabrielle Tétrault-Farber; writing by Tom Balmforth; editing by Larry King)