Police made nearly 300 arrests on Monday as Archbishop Bagrat Galstanian and his supporters continued to demonstrate in Yerevan to demand Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian’s resignation.
The protesters were detained as they blocked streets in the city center in the morning to step up the pressure on Pashinian. There were reports of similar blockages of highways outside the Armenian capital. The police used force to unblock them as well.
The chief of the national police, Aram Hovannisian, accused the protesters of “behaving like thugs” as he oversaw the crackdown in downtown Yerevan.
The Armenian Interior Ministry put the total number of detained protesters at 284 in the afternoon. A ministry spokesman said 278 of them have already been released without charge.
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The detainees included two opposition lawmakers affiliated with the Armenian Revolutionary Federation (Dashnaktsutyun) party. Footage posted on social media showed members of a special police squad punching and swearing at one of them, Ashot Simonian, outside the Dashnaktsutyun headquarters.
In a statement, Dashnaktsutyun accused the policemen of acting like “street hooligans” and demanded criminal proceedings against them. The Interior Ministry said it has launched an internal inquiry into the incident.
Meanwhile, Galstanian again marched through the city center together with a hundred supporters. He announced afterwards that they will head to a World War One memorial 50 kilometers west of Yerevan to spend the night there and celebrate the next morning the 106th anniversary of the establishment of a short-lived independent Armenian republic.
Official ceremonies to mark the public holiday called Republic Day have traditionally been held at the Sardarapat memorial. It was not clear whether Galstanian planned to try prevent Pashinian and other top state officials from visiting the site on Tuesday.
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