Turan Research Center

The Armenian Apostolic Church (AAC), one of the oldest Christian institutions, made Armenia the first nation to adopt Christianity as its state religion in 301 AD under St. Gregory the Illuminator and King Tiridates III. Over centuries of foreign domination and diaspora, it has served as the primary guardian of Armenian national identity, language, culture, and historical continuity, while continuing to occupy an important role in Armenian social, moral, and everyday life.

Now, the AAC has entered a phase of political engagement unprecedented in Armenia’s post-independence history. Long regarded as a guardian of national identity and a symbol of cultural continuity rather than a direct political actor, the Church has increasingly positioned itself as a central pillar of opposition to Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s government. This shift has unfolded in parallel with Armenia’s attempted strategic reorientation away from Russian security dependence and toward Western-backed connectivity and normalization initiatives, most notably the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity (TRIPP), also known as the Zangezur Corridor.

The Church’s political activism cannot be understood solely as a domestic reaction to government policy. Rather, it reflects the convergence of internal elite resistance with external pressures exerted by Russia and Iran — two actors whose strategic interests are threatened by Armenia’s prospective integration into Western economic and security frameworks. In this context, the AAC has emerged as a uniquely effective vehicle for influence: socially authoritative, constitutionally ambiguous in its political boundaries, and historically intertwined with Russian intelligence and pro-Russian elite networks.

The AAC’s political positioning also resonates with a longer history of religious institutions as vectors of geopolitical contention. A salient comparative case can be found in Ukraine, where the Russian Orthodox Church and its affiliated Ukrainian Orthodox Church (historically aligned with the Moscow Patriarchate) became a focus of contention after Russia’s full-scale invasion in 2022. Russian authorities and church leadership repeatedly invoked shared Orthodox heritage to justify political claims and to criticize Kyiv’s moves toward religious independence, even as Ukraine moved to establish an autocephalous church recognized by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. Moscow’s use of ecclesiastical structures in Ukraine exemplifies a broader pattern in which religious institutions — especially those with transnational affiliations — are leveraged to shape political narratives and influence state behavior. In the Ukrainian case, the Orthodox Church became a proxy battleground in which Russia’s broader strategic aims were articulated through appeals to religious identity and historical unity, even as Kyiv viewed these appeals as undermining its sovereignty. Moscow-backed church structures were actively used to propagate narratives framing Ukrainian statehood as illegitimate, to challenge Kyiv’s authority, and to undermine U.S. support for Ukraine by presenting Western backing as interference in “historically Orthodox lands,” even as Ukraine moved to establish an autocephalous church recognized by the Ecumenical Patriarchate. This Ukrainian example illustrates how religious institutions with transnational affiliations can be leveraged to shape political narratives, legitimize foreign policy aims, and contest sovereignty.

Armenia now faces a parallel dilemma. The AAC’s transnational ties, historical intelligence linkages, and political mobilization echo patterns observed in Ukraine, suggesting that ecclesiastical influence is being repurposed as a strategic tool in response to declining secular leverage.

Connectivity, Constitutional Reform, and the Strategic Timeline

The immediate geopolitical context for the Church–state confrontation is the proposed TRIPP, brokered by the United States at the August 2025 Washington Peace Summit. The project envisages an unimpeded transit route through Armenia’s Syunik province connecting mainland Azerbaijan with its Nakhchivan exclave and onward to Turkey and European markets. If implemented, the corridor would substantially reduce Iran’s role as a regional transit hub and diminish Russia’s leverage as Armenia’s principal security arbiter.

The corridor’s realization is closely tied to Armenia’s domestic political trajectory. Pashinyan has indicated that a renewed mandate following the June 2026 parliamentary elections would allow his government to initiate a constitutional referendum removing references to the 1990 Declaration of Independence that Azerbaijan interprets as an implicit territorial claim over Karabakh. From the government’s perspective, this amendment is a prerequisite for a comprehensive peace treaty with Azerbaijan and for completing Armenia’s transition from what Pashinyan has described as “Historical Armenia” to a “Real Armenia” grounded in sovereign statehood rather than inherited claims and Russian security guarantees.

For both Moscow and Tehran, this trajectory represents a strategic loss. Russia risks forfeiting one of its last reliable levers in the South Caucasus, while Iran faces the prospect of being structurally bypassed by new east–west trade routes. Preventing the consolidation of political support for this course has therefore become a shared objective, albeit pursued through different means.

The Church’s Political Turn and the Collapse of Post-2018 Equilibrium

Relations between the AAC and the state began to deteriorate following the 2018 Velvet Revolution, which brought Pashinyan to power on an anti-corruption and reformist platform. Prior to that moment, the Church had little incentive to intervene directly in politics. Armenia’s presidents were uniformly pro-Russian, embedded in oligarchic patronage systems, and broadly aligned with the Church’s geopolitical worldview. The separation between ecclesiastical authority and day-to-day politics was therefore as much a product of shared interests as of constitutional principle.

That equilibrium collapsed after 2018. The new government’s emphasis on transparency, institutional reform, and foreign policy diversification generated unease within the Church hierarchy, which had long operated in symbiosis with the pre-revolutionary elite. Early signs of mistrust were evident, particularly as Pashinyan’s rhetoric suggested that reform would eventually extend to all public institutions, including those traditionally shielded by moral authority.

The rupture became overt after the 2020 Nagorno-Karabakh war. While the Church framed its criticism of the government in spiritual and civilizational terms, the substance of its opposition increasingly overlapped with the agenda of secular forces seeking to halt normalization with Azerbaijan and Turkey. This convergence was most visible in the 2024 “Tavush for Our Fatherland” movement led by Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, which mobilized tens of thousands against border delimitation and portrayed territorial compromise as a betrayal of Armenian identity and faith. The protests coincided with increasingly belligerent rhetoric from senior church officials, with Shirak Archbishop Mikael Ajaphyan calling the Pashinyan administration “traitors” who “deserve to be shot” over the loss of Karabakh to Azerbaijan. By shifting the debate from constitutional legality to existential morality, the movement sought to delegitimize electoral mandates and policy trade-offs alike.

The government responded by framing this activism as unconstitutional political interference. In 2025, Armenian authorities arrested several Church-affiliated figures, including high-ranking clerics, including Galstanyan and Ajaphyan, on charges ranging from obstruction of voting procedures to participation in an attempted coup. Among those implicated were individuals linked to opposition networks with strong financial and political ties to Russia. The Church and its supporters characterized these actions as persecution and described the Church as being “under siege,” while the government argued that it was enforcing the constitutional separation of Church and state.

Russian Influence: Intelligence Continuities and Elite Patronage

The plausibility of Russian involvement in the Church’s political role is reinforced by the AAC’s historical entanglement with Soviet and post-Soviet security structures. During the Soviet period, a significant proportionof Armenian clergy serving abroad were recruited by the KGB, creating dense networks of obligation and influence. Armenian parliamentarians have stated publicly that many of these connections persisted after independence, shaping the institutional culture of the Church well into the post-Soviet era.

These legacies are most frequently discussed in connection with Catholicos Karekin II. Long-standing allegations — circulating even among dissident clergy — that his election in 1999 occurred under Russian pressure have never been conclusively resolved. His public rhetoric has reinforced perceptions of alignment: he has referred to Russia as the “second homeland” of Armenians, and he has received high-level Russian state honors, including an award from Russian President Vladimir Putin recognizing his contribution to Russo-Armenian relations.

Russian influence also operates through oligarchic channels closely linked to the Church. Samvel Karapetyan, a Russian-Armenian billionaire named in the U.S. Treasury’s 2018 “Kremlin List” and sanctioned by Ukraine in 2019 over his ties to Moscow, has been identified in Armenian media and investigative reporting as a major donor to Church-linked initiatives and opposition causes. Karapetyan was arrested last year on accusations of an alleged coup planning involving Church allies. Although legal proceedings remain contested, the pattern mirrors established Kremlin practices in the post-Soviet space: combining religious legitimacy, oligarchic financing, and political mobilization to preserve influence where secular proxies have weakened.

Former President Robert Kocharyan, widely regarded as Moscow’s preferred interlocutor in Armenia, has openly called for Armenia’s next leader to be chosen from the Church and has previously advocated for the country’s “full-fledged integration” with Russia. When Pashinyan accused Kocharyan of orchestrating the protests, the statement was widely interpreted as an indirect attribution of responsibility to Moscow itself. This interpretation was reinforced by Pashinyan’s simultaneous threat to restrict Russian television channels accused of disseminating anti-government narratives.

Iran’s Strategy: Soft Power, Proxy Logic, and Corridor Politics

Iran’s engagement with the Armenian Church follows a more indirect but increasingly explicit logic. Publicly, Tehran emphasizes interfaith dialogue and presents the AAC as evidence of religious coexistence within Iran. Armenians are frequently highlighted in official discourse as a loyal and respected community, and the Church is cited as a bridge of friendship between Tehran and Yerevan.

Unofficially, Iranian strategic discourse treats the Church as a security-relevant social actor. This was articulated with unusual clarity by Ehsan Movahedian, a senior Iranian analyst on Caucasus affairs, who urged Iran to “synergize” with the Armenian Church to advance Iranian foreign policy objectives. Movahedian explicitly compared the Church to Husseiniyyun, the Iran-backed Shiite proxy group operating in Azerbaijan, describing the two as “two wings” of Iranian influence in the South Caucasus. While the Church is not a militant organization, the analogy reflects Tehran’s view of it as a mechanism for shaping narratives, mobilizing constituencies, and constraining state decision-making without direct intervention.

A similar line of thinking appears in analyses published by the Institute for Research of Eurasia and Asia (IRAS), an Iranian think tank closely aligned with conservative strategic circles. In commentary on recent developments, IRAS described Archbishop Galstanyan as the authentic representative of the Armenian nation and suggested — albeit obliquely — that the Armenian Church could play a role analogous to that of the Shiite clergy in the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The implied parallel is unmistakable within the Iranian ideological lexicon: just as clerical leadership mobilized against the Shah, the Armenian Church might serve as a focal point of resistance to what Tehran and its aligned analysts frame as the unjust and externally influenced policies of the current Armenian government.

Iran’s interest is driven primarily by opposition to TRIPP. The corridor threatens to marginalize Iran’s transit role and weaken its leverage over both Armenia and Azerbaijan. Iranian officials, including Supreme Leader Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, have been open about their opposition to TRIPP, calling it a “red line.” Ali Akbar Velayati, a senior adviser to Iran's Supreme Leader, went further, warning that TRIPP would become a "graveyard for the mercenaries of Donald Trump.” By amplifying Church narratives that frame the corridor and normalization as existential threats posed by a “Turkic axis,” Iran can indirectly foster domestic resistance to the constitutional and political changes required for the project’s implementation.

Pashinyan’s Strategic Shift: From Political Contestation to Spiritual Legitimacy

Initially, Pashinyan sought to counter the Church’s activism through political and constitutional arguments, emphasizing legal prohibitions on clerical involvement in partisan politics. This approach proved ineffective, as it allowed the Church to position itself as a moral authority persecuted by a secular state.

Beginning in late 2024 and intensifying in 2025, the government altered its strategy. Rather than contesting the Church’s political claims, Pashinyan and government-aligned actors began to challenge the spiritual legitimacy of Catholicos Karekin II directly. Central to this shift were public allegations that Karekin II had violated his celibacy vow and fathered a child — an accusation that, if accepted by believers, would fundamentally undermine his standing as a spiritual leader. These claims were accompanied by broader accusations of corruption, opaque financial practices, and collaboration with foreign intelligence services, supported by investigative reporting examining patterns of institutional penetration and group treason.

This escalation marked a deliberate attempt to move the conflict from the political arena — where the Church enjoys structural advantages — into the spiritual domain, where moral credibility is decisive. The risks are considerable: politicizing spiritual legitimacy threatens to polarize society and destabilize long-standing norms. Yet from the government’s perspective, the alternative is acquiescence to a parallel authority increasingly aligned with foreign strategic objectives.

Conclusion

The Armenian Apostolic Church’s transformation into an active political actor reflects the convergence of domestic elite resistance and external strategic interference. For Russia, the Church represents one of the last institutional footholds capable of constraining Armenia’s westward realignment after the erosion of secular proxies. For Iran, it offers a culturally legitimate means of sustaining volatility and obstructing connectivity projects that threaten Tehran’s regional position.

As Armenia approaches the June 2026 elections, the contest between the government and the Church will shape not only domestic political outcomes but the regional order itself. The central question is no longer simply whether Armenia will implement a corridor or amend its constitution, but whether democratic institutions or ecclesiastical structures — repurposed as instruments of foreign influence — will ultimately arbitrate sovereignty in the South Caucasus.

Alex Grinberg is a Senior Fellow at the Turan Research Center, a resident Iran expert at the Jerusalem Institute for Strategy and Security, a research fellow at the Begin Sadat Center for Strategic Studies, and a Captain in the reserves of the Israeli Defense Forces’ Intelligence.