Azernews.Az

Akbar Novruz

Read more

Following the formation of Armenia’s new government on 3 August, twelve of the same ministers retained their portfolios, with only one change at the cabinet level: David Tadevosyan was appointed Minister of High-Tech Industry, replacing Mkhitar Hayrapetyan, who apparently refused to accept a deputy appointed by Pashinyan above him. Earlier in June, Pashinyan stated that he saw no need for major changes. While this may have been true on the surface, he remained silent about what lay beneath it. The more telling story of Armenia’s new government lies not in the composition of the cabinet, but rather in the staffing changes, the appointment of parliamentary speakers, and the replacement of deputy ministers with Pashinyan loyalists whose entire political careers have unfolded under his wing. Taken together, these changes point to an elected leader who secured an outright plurality - 64 seats, amounting to three-fifths of a majority - yet is governing like a man who expects the next two years to be more difficult than the last two.

Chief of staff was assigned to Lilit Makunts, following the resignation of the outgoing chief of staff Arayik Harutyunyan, who, after spending five years in the position, decided to step down and return to parliament as an ordinary MP. As the outgoing chief of staff, Makunts, who served as Minister of Culture, parliamentary faction leader, Ambassador of Armenia to the United States, and advisor to the Prime Minister, has considerable institutional weight and belongs entirely to the political environment around Pashinyan. Thus, Pashinyan managed to replace a chief of staff who had, after five years in office, built his own networks and institutional weight. Pashinyan's new parliamentary speaker is Ruben Rubinyan, elected on August 3rd – Pashinyan’s personal envoy for negotiations on Armenia-Türkiye normalization talks and a protege with no political base at all.

The same applies to the leaders of the parliamentary factions and also to the changes in the deputies of ministerial positions in several ministries. This is a clear strategy: people with personal reputation and connections are being sidelined and sent into parliamentary retirement with honour, while those replacing them are selected for loyalty and not prominence. There has been no purge, there have been no arrests and no humiliation; Pashinyan has been careful not to make it look like a purge. But there has definitely been consolidation.

What are the main challenges amidst the reshuffles?

Referendum on the constitution: The peace agreement with Azerbaijan requires the removal of references to "Nagorno-Karabakh" in the constitution of Armenia. Sixty-four seats in the Civil Contract are not enough to launch a referendum, as it takes a two-thirds majority to do so without the help of the opposition. Pashinyan requires political space, which he lacks now.

Russian railway concession: The contract will be valid till 2038. Pashinyan changed his position from cancelling it to buying it out partially, as Russia threatens with $400 million compensation claims. It is an active issue and there are high stakes for Armenia to integrate itself in terms of transportation.

Energy transition: Pashinyan confirmed that specialists from Azerbaijan came to Armenian facilities twice to inspect the country's electricity generation and transmission infrastructure of Armenia. Its aged nuclear power station is not even under its control, and it is still lacking funding for energy transition.

Autumn elections in regions: A bad result will provide a pro-Russian opposition with domestic discourse which can later be used by Moscow in the region to put pressure on the normalization process.

Aftermath and the anniversary call

On August 8th, which marked the one-year anniversary of the peace summit in Washington, Pashinyan called President Ilham Aliyev. The summary reported that both sides appreciated Trump’s contribution to the peace process and touched upon the possibility of Azerbaijani oil products’ exports to Armenia as well as the TRIPP corridor. The mood was friendly, and as much as the content stated concretely: more than 40,000 tons of transit cargo have been delivered via Azerbaijan to Armenia over the past year since the Washington summit; fuel shipments occurred in the opposite direction; the bilateral relations have developed within the period of a year from frozen to functioning.

Yet this call also implicitly recognised the fact that it still needs to happen. The peace agreement is not signed, but merely initialled. The constitutional amendment demanded by Azerbaijan was not put up for a vote at a referendum. The 41 kilometres of Zangezur corridor [TRIPP] through Armenia are not even in the planning stages yet. While a year has passed in Washington, real, quantifiable normalisation at the bilateral level and an impasse at the treaty level have emerged. In this context, Pashinyan's reshuffles could be seen as a preparation for more difficult decisions rather than a result of taken decisions.

The initiative that requires the most attention among all those launched by the Armenian authorities is certainly that related to the talent pool: 1,141 applicants who are graduates of top universities in the world, 459 of whom proceed to the second stage, aged 34 on average. This initiative was launched by Pashinyan on June 15th, right after the results of the election were known, and was confirmed on August 3rd by the fact that the government is constructing a recruitment pipeline. This initiative is indicative of the authorities' desire to introduce, step-by-step, the layers of technocrats that developed within the institutional environment of post-Soviet states – but without any nostalgia about Russian institutions and with knowledge of Western professional standards.

The very nature of the reshuffle seems to indicate that such instincts are alive and well. Pashinyan has taken advantage of the opportunity offered by the election results to cut down the ranks of his semi-independent advisors rather than add more to them. That may well be the logical reaction to the particular challenges that he is faced with a constitutional math that depends on the opposition’s agreement, a railway conflict with Russia that can be exploited by Moscow, a partnership with Azerbaijan over energy that is both profitable and sensitive, and a peace deal that requires domestic political courage which is easier to muster if you can keep everything under your own control. But whether this will result in a government flexible enough to act strategically in the two years ahead is another matter.

"Armenia cannot afford to have its import and export routes concentrated in a single direction and must develop alternative markets and transport links." Nikol Pashinyan, on Armenia's EAEU relationship, August 2026

With the first sitting of the new parliament, opposition MPs refusing to take the parliamentary oath due to the lack of the Catholicos' participation in the ceremony is perhaps a move that symbolically revealed both the strategy of the opposition and its limitations. Criminal charges against members of Strong Armenia can be viewed as a countermeasure, which makes the main opposition defensive in its actions. Neither side has an advantage. While Pashinyan possesses the mandate and control of the institutions, the opposition has the backing of Russia and the moral strength of the church. This balance of forces will dominate Armenia's internal politics for the coming four years, in the context of a peace process, which is yet to be completed - and hopefully won't take long.