On Monday, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan alleged that Catholicos Karekin II had a child. That same day, government-affiliated clickbait media circulated a photo and the name of his alleged daughter. Meanwhile, members of the ruling Civil Contract party have called on people to not disseminate pictures and names of the alleged wives and children of celibate members of the clergy.
Prior to the insinuation that Karekin II had a child, Pashinyan suggested that the Armenian state ‘must have’ a decisive say on the election of the head of the church.
Aside from the accusation directed against the head of the church, Pashinyan, his wife Anna Hakobyan, and other members of the ruling Civil Contract party have accused members of the clergy of breaking their vow of celibacy, as well as paedophilia.
The ongoing conflict between Pashinyan and the church renewed on 29 May, following Pashinyan’s statement that churches had been turned into ‘storerooms’ during his cabinet meeting.
Arshaluys Barseghyan
On Monday evening, following a meeting of the Supreme Spiritual Council, the Armenian Church responded to Pashinyan’s recent series of accusations, the first time it has done so.
The Armenian Church called the allegations a ‘shameful anti-Church campaign incited by […] using language unbecoming of a statesman — replete with insults and accusations — and positioning himself above the law’.
As for its goal, the church stated that the accusations sought to ‘silence the Church’s voice and diminish its influence in public life’, additionally warning that they carry ‘destructive consequences and pose a serious threat to Armenian statehood and the unity of our people’.
‘These reprehensible actions serve the agendas of external anti-Armenian forces fueled by Armenophobia and align with the slander and false accusations levelled against the Armenian people and the Armenian Church by the Azerbaijani propaganda apparatus’, the statement read.
The Armenian Church also called on the competent state authorities ‘to halt the Prime Minister’s unlawful and shortsighted policies’.
‘The question must be clarified without delay’
Despite the Mother See breaking its silence following the series of accusations, Pashinyan and members of his ruling Civil Contract party noted that Pashinyan’s allegation that Catholicos Karekin II had a child in the church remained unaddressed.
‘This question must be clarified without delay’, Pashinyan insisted.
In turn, Arayik Harutyunyan, Pashinyan’s Chief of Staff and a prominent member of the Civil Contract party, posted a question on Facebook — ‘Yes, or no, does [Karekin II have a child], or not?’.
Pashinyan swiftly faced criticism for his post on 30 May, in which he alleged that an unnamed high-ranking member of the clergy was ‘banging [his] uncle’s wife’, making the issue of whether the episcopates were ‘truly faithful to their vow of celibacy’ a priority issue of his political agenda.
Around 15 rights organisations called the statement ‘discriminatory’, and claimed it contained ‘the disclosure of information about the alleged partner’ of a high-ranking member of the clergy.
Following the criticism and Pashinyan’s Monday allegation that Karekin II has a child, another prominent Civil Contract member, Vahagn Aleksanyan, in a Facebook post ‘ask[ed], urge[d], and demand[ed]’ people not to share photos or names of the alleged wives and children of celibate members of the clergy, and not to target them.
Aleksanyan suggested that the ongoing confrontation with the church and the accusations offered by their government to the clergy was not about the alleged children or the wives.
However, OC Media found out that a website affiliated with the ruling party was among those circulating such content.
Medianews.site, which Armenian fact-checkers refer to as a clickbait website, is registered under the name of Taron Chakoyan, the Deputy Chief of Pashinyan’s Staff. On Monday, it published the name and the photo of the alleged daughter of Karekin II, vaguely suggesting that the photo was sourced off the internet.
As of Wednesday, Pashinyan has continued attacking the church with multiple social media posts per day, repeatedly posting quotes from the Bible, suggesting that it guided his campaign, which is being driven by good intentions.
On Tuesday, during a closed-door meeting with students at Yerevan State University, Pashinyan shared ‘exclusive information’ that he had instructed the relevant bodies to investigate the issue of Karekin II’s celibacy, RFE/RL quoted attendee Hovhannes Shamrikyan as saying.
Arshaluys Barseghyan
