Armenian police and special forces from the country’s National Security Service (NSS) entered the grounds of the Mother See of Holy Etchmiadzin, the administrative center of the Armenian Apostolic Church and the residence of its spiritual leader, on Friday, according to the outlet News.am.
NSS officers also reportedly searched the home of Archbishop Mikael Adjapahyan, head of the church’s Shirak Diocese, in the city of Gyumri.
Archbishop Adjapahyan was attending a gathering of clergymen in Etchmiadzin at the time of the search. A day earlier, the Armenian Prosecutor General’s Office had announced that Adjapahyan was facing criminal charges for alleged public calls to seize power.
Shortly after security forces arrived, Adjapahyan came out to meet them and addressed the assembled crowd, saying he had no intention of hiding.
“I don’t want it to look like I’m hiding behind my brothers, and I’m not hiding behind anyone. They [the NSS] came for me, and I’ll go with them. I’ll say it even louder: what’s happening is illegal. I am not a threat to this country — the real threat is already in power. I haven’t been a threat, and I won’t be. But the people carrying out the will of this madman are threatening me, and I’m going with them,” News.am quoted him as saying.
According to the Russian state outlet Sputnik Armenia, a scuffle broke out between security forces and members of the clergy.
Armenian Apostolic Church leader Catholicos Karekin II spoke to journalists in the courtyard of the Etchmiadzin Cathedral.
“His Grace [Archbishop Adjapahyan] will now go with our lawyer,” the Catholicos said. “We will return to the residence, where the clergy meeting was taking place, and decide on our next steps. We will do everything in our power to ensure justice prevails.”
Sputnik Armenia also reported that a group of clergy and believers shut the compound’s gates, refusing to allow the archbishop or the Catholicos to leave to meet the authorities.
Earlier this week, Armenia’s Investigative Committee announced that members and supporters of the opposition movement Sacred Struggle, led by Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, had been planning terrorist attacks and a coup attempt.
Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan claimed that law enforcement had foiled a major plot by a “criminal, oligarchic clergy” to destabilize the country. Law enforcement searched the homes of Sacred Struggle supporters. Archbishop Galstanyan was detained and later placed under arrest for two months.
The raids and arrests connected to the alleged coup plot come amid a sharp escalation in tensions between Pashinyan and the Armenian Apostolic Church.
The prime minister has publicly said that Armenian churches resemble “closets filled with junk” and accused Catholicos Karekin II of violating his vow of celibacy and fathering a child. In response, the Church has declared that “the government’s anti-church policy is clearly political in nature and its goal is to undermine the authority of the Church both inside the country and on the international stage.”
