British Lawmaker Accuses Pashinyan Government of Attacking Armenian Church’s Autonomy
Armenia’s escalating dispute between Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s government and the Armenian Apostolic Church spilled onto the floor of the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, where a British lawmaker accused Yerevan of attacking religious autonomy and an Armenian ruling-party MP defended the government’s actions as an effort to protect the Church.
The exchange came during debate over PACE’s final report on Armenia’s June 7 parliamentary elections.
Edward Leigh, a British Conservative lawmaker, raised the treatment of the Armenian Apostolic Church while discussing outside interference in Armenia’s domestic affairs. He pointed to criminal proceedings against senior clergy, restrictions imposed on some church figures and the government’s campaign against Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II.
Leigh accused Pashinyan’s government of erasing the boundary between church and state and said the dispute had gone far beyond an ordinary political confrontation.
“What we are witnessing is not an ordinary political disagreement,” Leigh said. “This is a calculated attack on religious autonomy.”
He said Karekin II was under intense pressure and also pointed to the Armenian government’s five-year program, which addresses changes in the leadership and governance of the Church.
Pashinyan has been calling for Karekin II to leave office for more than a year. The prime minister has accused the Catholicos of violating his vow of celibacy, drawing the Church into politics and allowing it to become a vehicle for foreign influence.
Karekin II has rejected the accusations and described the campaign against him and other clergy as government persecution of the Armenian Apostolic Church. He has shown no indication that he intends to step down.
The confrontation has increasingly moved into Armenia’s courts.
Several senior clergymen have faced criminal proceedings over the past year, including Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, the former head of the Tavush Diocese who led a protest movement demanding Pashinyan’s resignation in 2024.
Galstanyan was detained last year and is now under house arrest as his case proceeds. Prosecutors have accused him and others of involvement in an alleged plot involving terrorism-related offenses. Galstanyan denies the charges, and the court has not issued a final verdict.
Leigh also criticized a recently published Armenian government report on what authorities describe as a crisis within the Church.
He portrayed the document as an attempt by the state to reshape the Church’s internal and canonical order.
“The use of state machinery to rewrite ancient ecclesiastical laws is a gross violation of human rights and religious freedom,” Leigh said.
He argued that the issue extended beyond the outcome of Armenia’s parliamentary elections and called on the Council of Europe to scrutinize the government’s conduct toward the Church.
“These elections are not just about political power,” Leigh said, adding that he was neutral about which political force governs Armenia. He accused authorities of using their electoral mandate to bring a religious institution under state control.
Hripsime Grigoryan, a lawmaker from Pashinyan’s Civil Contract party, pushed back against Leigh, saying his description did not reflect what was happening in Armenia.
“What the Armenian government and the Armenian state are actually doing is protecting the Church,” Grigoryan said.
She then made serious allegations against Karekin II, claiming that the Church leader was directly involved in unlawful activity aimed at undermining the Armenian state. She also alleged that his brother had ties to Russia as a foreign agent.
Grigoryan did not present evidence for those claims during the exchange.
Turning to the criminal cases against senior clergy, she said their religious positions had nothing to do with the prosecutions.
“The bishops are not detained because they are bishops,” Grigoryan said. “There are criminal cases against them. It is not for us to decide; the court must make the final decision.”
She said the cases included allegations involving terrorism-related acts against Armenian citizens.
The defendants have denied wrongdoing, and proceedings in several of the cases remain ongoing.
The Strasbourg exchange brought an increasingly bitter domestic confrontation onto a major European political platform. The government maintains that criminal investigations involving clergy must be treated like any other cases and says its broader campaign is intended to protect the Armenian Apostolic Church.
Church leaders and government critics argue that the state has crossed into the internal affairs of an institution that has played a central role in Armenian religious and national life for centuries.
The debate was not Leigh’s first public confrontation with Armenia’s government.
During an earlier PACE session, Pashinyan sharply challenged the British lawmaker after Leigh used the term “Zangezur corridor” while discussing a proposed transport connection between Azerbaijan and its Nakhijevan exclave through southern Armenia.
The phrase is frequently used by Azerbaijani officials. Armenia rejects the terminology and says any transport routes crossing its territory must remain under Armenian sovereignty and jurisdiction.
Pashinyan told Leigh to review the documents signed in Washington in 2025, saying no agreement between Armenia and Azerbaijan contained such language.
“Where did you get that expression from? Where did you read about it?” Pashinyan asked.
“There is no such expression, there has not been one, and rest assured there will not be one in any Armenia-Azerbaijan agreed document.”
The latest confrontation in Strasbourg shows how Armenia’s church-state dispute, once largely a domestic political battle, is increasingly drawing scrutiny beyond the country’s borders.
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