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Akbar Novruz

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Armenian Defence Minister Suren Papikyan has pledged to make the activities of the country’s armed forces more publicly accessible wherever possible, as the Armenian army faces renewed scrutiny following a series of non-combat deaths in recent months.

Papikyan made the remarks on Thursday in a video posted on social media while travelling to several Armenian army bases. He did not specify which activities he was referring to, but said the locations for his visit had been selected based on issues raised by members of the public, including soldiers’ families.

“Taking this into account, we chose the direction today, and since our work has not previously been covered, and also taking into consideration your interest and thanking you for following us, we have decided to make our activities more public from now on,” Papikyan said.

He stressed, however, that some aspects of the military’s work would remain confidential.

“Of course, there will be closed parts, which are mainly due to the confidentiality of our work, but wherever it is possible to show our work, we will show it,” the minister said.

Papikyan subsequently published several more videos documenting his activities during the day, including visits to army units, military training facilities and a construction site where fortifications were being built.

Another video showed the defence minister having lunch with conscript soldiers at a military position.

“We ate the canned food provided for the [military] positions,” Papikyan wrote alongside the video.

In the footage, Papikyan, dressed in military fatigues, examined the food provided to soldiers and asked them to show him uncooked food from the cans.

The posts appear to highlight elements of the Armenian army’s ongoing reforms, including changes to food provision, an area that has previously drawn criticism over the perceived quality of military meals.

Papikyan’s decision to increase the visibility of his work comes amid heightened public attention to non-combat deaths in the Armenian armed forces.

Several Armenian soldiers died in non-combat circumstances in August, with several of the deaths occurring within a short period of one another.

The deaths prompted further scrutiny of conditions within the armed forces. In response, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan ordered personnel changes in the military leadership and established an interagency working group tasked with developing systemic measures to address suicides and what authorities describe as “non-statutory relations.”