Armenians March in Thousands to Demand Prime Minister’s Resignation

On Friday, 26th February, several thousand opposition supporters marched through the capital of Armenia to demand the resignation of the country’s Prime Minister, Nikol Pashinyan’s over his handling of last year’s war with Azerbaijan which many see as a national humiliation.

Columns of people angry with the prime minister flooded the streets of central Yerevan, waving Armenian flags and chanting anti-government slogans, hours before a planned meeting with the ex-Soviet country’s president.
Former Prime Minister Vazgen Manukyan, who has been put forward by the opposition to replace Pashinyan, called on all Armenians to join the protest.

But the opposition gathered around 10,000 of its own supporters, who erected barricades and set up tents and stoves outside the parliament building and vowed to hold round-the-clock demonstrations.
The crisis spilled into a second day after Pashinyan’s critics blocked streets near the parliament building in preparation for Friday’s rally.
The march led them to the presidency and then to the prime minister’s residence, before later returning to parliament.

By 19:30 (1530 GMT) around 2,000 opposition supporters were milling outside the parliament building. Some waved Armenian flags and said they would camp out a second night, an AFP correspondent reported.
– War with Azerbaijan –
A leader of the opposition Dashnaktsutyun party, Gegham Manukyan, told reporters that opposition parties would only speak with Pashinyan about “his resignation”.
Pashinyan has said he is ready to start talks with the opposition to defuse tensions but also threatened to arrest any opponents if they violate the law.