Pashinyan wants Catholicos “free from foreign intelligence ties”

PanARMENIAN.Net - Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan says he “does not want a Catholicos who is loyal to him, but rather one who would not submit to a foreign intelligence lieutenant.”

Speaking during a parliamentary Q&A session in response to an accusation from opposition MP Anna Grigoryan of the Hayastan faction that he wants a church under his control, Pashinyan said:

"I do not want a Catholicos who obeys me; I want a Catholicos who does not take orders from a lieutenant of a foreign intelligence agency and does not report to them daily. I have absolutely no such ambitions," Pashinyan stated, as reported by Armenpress.

Addressing whether Archbishop Navasard Kchoyan had disclosed his wealth to him, the Prime Minister said that neither he nor any other clergyman owes him such an account. He said that all clergy should be transparent before their communities.

He further criticized the current state of the Armenian Apostolic Church under Catholicos, claiming that many churches lack choirs, which, according to him, undermines the proper conduct of liturgies.

"You do not acknowledge the reality where a narrow elite has become millionaires, while many priests today live on the brink of poverty," Pashinyan told the opposition. "You ignore the fact that priesthood appointments often depend on connections; some are assigned to insignificant positions or sent to remote areas where no one goes. The churches in Armenia have become ruins, proper services are not held, and spiritual life is practically absent."

He accused the Catholicos and his supporters of using the church as a tool for intrigue, saying: "Ktrich Nersisyan and his defenders are working against the Armenian Apostolic Church because, for them, the Church has been and should remain merely an instrument of scheming. We will not allow this. Ktrich Nersisyan must resign. There is no alternative. We will take the most peaceful route, but he must go. Not even senior or junior lieutenants, captains, majors, or even generals and colonel generals from foreign intelligence agencies can save him."

A group of senior Armenian Church clergy—archbishops and bishops—recently released a statement accusing Catholicos of All Armenians Karekin II of covering up the misconduct of Mother See Chancellor, Archbishop Arshak Khachatryan, which was allegedly caught on video. They also claim that Karekin II has betrayed his oath. Pashinyan has met with the dissenting clergy and welcomed their stance. In a new statement on November 29, they demanded that the Catholicos retire. Karekin II has since called a bishops’ synod for December 10–12.