Ter-Petrosian warned on Wednesday that an attempt to forcibly remove Catholicos Garegin from the Mother See would lead to “bloodshed.”
Pashinian has been pressuring Garegin to resign, saying that the supreme head of the church had fathered a child in breach of a vow of celibacy. His detractors say that he is simply trying to please Azerbaijan and/or neutralize a key source of opposition to his unilateral concessions to Armenia’s arch-foe.
In a weekend appeal to his supporters, Pashinian pledged to “free” the Echmiadzin seat of the Catholicos and urged them to be ready to rally there for that purpose. Garegin’s office condemned the appeal as an “attempt to incite attacks and violence.” Opposition leaders and public figures critical of the government warned, for their part, that they are ready to mobilize their own supporters to defend the Catholicos.
Pashinian reaffirmed his plans on Wednesday. But he again gave no date for the rally.
In a statement released on Tuesday, Ter-Petrosian denounced the planned gathering as a “provocation aimed at crushing the Church through a mob.” He claimed that Pashinian is intent on “creating chaos in the country” while realizing that his supporters are greatly outnumbered by Garegin’s followers.
“It is opposition political forces that usually instigate unrest, whereas in Armenia the exact opposite is happening,” he said. “Suffering from megalomania, Pashinian, as a rule, himself inflames the situation.”
Ter-Petrosian said the premier should defuse political tensions in the country by releasing Archbishops Bagrat Galstanian and Mikael Ajapahian, billionaire Samvel Karapetian and other “political prisoners.”
The 80-year-old ex-president, who had repeatedly condemned Pashinian’s campaign against the top clergy, repeated this call in another statement released the following day.
“I am sure that this step would be viewed not as a sign of weakness by our people but as a manifestation of common sense worthy of a statesman. Otherwise, Mr. Prime Minister, you would be solely responsible for possible clashes and bloodshed,” he warned.
Senior members of Pashinian’s Civil Contract party scoffed at Ter-Petrosian’s statements. One of them, Arusiak Julhakian, claimed that there is no political standoff or tension in Armenia. There is only a “legitimate government” facing a “terrorist clique trying to illegally depose” it, she said.
Critics say that Pashinian’s efforts to depose Garegin violate constitutional provisions upholding the church’s separation from the state. Ara Zohrabian, a lawyer strongly supporting the Catholicos, on Tuesday demanded that Pashinian be prosecuted for the “repressions” unleashed by him.
In a motion sent to Prosecutor-General Anna Vardapetian on behalf of a small party led by him, Zohrabian charged that the premier is abusing his powers, overthrowing the constitutional order, spreading hate speech and violating religious freedom.
“Pashinian does not make secret of presiding over all this, and we immediately see criminal cases, court decisions, including those on the detention of individuals,” the lawyer told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “For example, as soon as he talks about some action on his Facebook page investigators carry out that action and the court executes it.”
Vardapetian, who previously worked as Pashinian’s legal adviser, has personally defended the separate accusations levelled against the two archbishops and other detainees. She is therefore bound to reject Zohrabian’s demands.
Ajapahian stands accused of calling for a violent regime change, a charge he and other critics of Pashinian reject as politically motivated. Security forces raided the Mother See on June 27 in a bid to arrest the outspoken archbishop. But they failed to do that after meeting with fierce resistance from hundreds of angry priests and laymen. Ajapahian surrendered to investigators several hours after the unprecedented raid.
