The most serious of those incidents happened in Yerevan in broad daylight on February 18. One man was killed and six others seriously wounded in a shootout reportedly involving dozens of members of rival criminal groups.
Two days earlier, another man was shot dead in a village just outside Yerevan. And on February 21, a 19-year-old soldier was stabbed to death in Sevan, a town 50 kilometers north of the Armenian capital.
Although the police made multiple arrests and claimed to have solved all three killings, the Armenian authorities are facing renewed criticism for their failure to reverse a steady increase in shootings, armed robberies and other firearm-related crimes committed in Armenia.
The police reported 152 such crimes last year, up from 109 in 2024 and 94 in 2023. Gun violence similarly surged by 40 percent in 2023.
No official reason was given for the sackings of the three top officers formalized by Interior Minister Arpine Sargsian. They headed key divisions of the national police, including the Criminal Police Directorate and the Patrol Service. Two of them were swiftly appointed as advisers to Sargsian. The other will now work as her assistant.
Opposition politicians claimed that Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian ordered the sackings in a bid to deflect blame for his administration’s failure to tackle violent crime. They said the police and other law-enforcement bodies cannot do their job properly because they are busy executing Pashinian’s orders to crack down on the Armenian Apostolic Church and critics of the Armenian government. All three fired policemen appear to have been personally involved in the crackdowns.
Armenia - Police guard the Hovanavank monastery during a Sunday mass held by a defrocked pro-government priest, October 26, 2025.
“For all those who follow Pashinian’s orders, this should be a very good lesson and example that [the authorities] won't hesitate to get rid of them,” said Kristine Vartanian, an opposition lawmaker.
“The problem is that the security apparatus has been tasked with combating Pashinian's opponents, and that's why we have what we have … And now they are trying to cover up the situation, deflecting responsibility from themselves,” Vartanian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
Hasmik Hakobian, a lawmaker representing the ruling Civil Contract party, denied any politically motivated repressions alleged by the opposition. She also downplayed the dismissals of the three deputy police chiefs.
“Who said that the same official should hold office for years?” reasoned Hakobian.
The chief of the Armenian police, Aram Ghazarian, was dismissed and moved to another post on January 19 after less than eight months in office. Pashinian replaced him by a fellow native of the northern town of Ijevan in a move linked by some observers to parliamentary elections slated for June 7.