A day after clashes with police, anti-government protesters gathered on June 13, this time outside the Armenian government building, as pressure continues to mount grows on Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian to step down as his country nears a controversial peace deal with Azerbaijan.
Thousands of Armenians staged the new rally a day after the clashes in which more than 100 people were injured when police fired stun grenades during an antigovernment rally outside parliament.
An Interior Ministry spokesperson told RFE/RL that 70 people had been detained on June 12 and there were injuries among both the protesters and the police in the clashes in central Yerevan.
Around 4,000 people gathered on June 13 for the rally led by Archbishop Bagrat Galstanian calling for Pashinian to step down, AFP reported. The outspoken 53-year-old leader of the Tavush for the Motherland movement opposes plans to hand over several border areas to Azerbaijan as part of a peace deal.
"The authorities are guilty of bringing this country to disaster," Galstanian told the crowd on June 13.
"We have shown yesterday that we have no fear and that our movement will persist," he added, vowing to force Pashinian to resign.
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Fresh Protests In Armenia As Activists Claim Police Brutality At Earlier Rally
Galstanian said that one of the main avenues of Yerevan that has been closed for the protest since June 9 will reopen on June 14 but added that the opposition to Pashinian "will continue perhaps in a slightly different way." He gave no details.
Protests have gripped Yerevan since April, when authorities agreed to hand back to archrival Azerbaijan territory that Armenia had controlled since the 1990s.
Residents of nearby settlements say the move cuts them off from the rest of the country and accuse Pashinian of giving away territory without getting anything in return. Pashinian has defended the move as part of efforts to secure peace with Azerbaijan.
Asked whether he would resign under pressure from the protests, Pashinian told journalists on June 12 that that if the people of Armenia want a change of government, they will change the government.
A weekly cabinet session that Pashinian was scheduled to chair on June 13 was postponed to June 14 due to scheduled discussions in parliament on the budget.
The prime minister also announced that no Armenian officials would be allowed to visit Belarus as long as Alyaksandr Lukashenka is the president, while the Foreign Ministry recalled Armenia's ambassador to Minsk for consultations after Pashinian accused members of the Russia-led Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), which includes Belarus, of having planned with Azerbaijan a war against his country.
The "next logical step" would be our withdrawal from the organization depending on questions Yerevan has for the CSTO.
He did not specify what those questions were, but said that Armenia will "decide when it (leaving the CSTO) happens."
"It could be a month, a year, or three years from now," he said in parliament on June 13, clarifying comments from a day earlier that many interpreted as him saying Armenia was leaving the CSTO.
The United States, meanwhile, plans to send an envoy to Armenia. The U.S. Embassy in Yerevan annouced that a delegation led by First Deputy Secretary of State for Management and Resources Richard Verman will arrive in Yerevan for an official visit on June 17. The delegation will participate in an Armenian-American forum dedicated to issues of democracy in local self-government, the embassy said.
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Verman will meet with Pashinian, Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan, and representatives of the public and private sectors and civil society groups.
"This visit testifies to our intention to further strengthen bilateral ties with the Armenian people," the U.S. Embassy said.