Pashinian dismissed Liparit Drmeyan as his government’s top lawyer representing it in international courts in August last year after the latter objected to his decision to seize Armenia’s national electric utility owned by jailed billionaire Samvel Karapetian.
Drmeyan specifically said that the Armenian authorities should comply with a Stockholm-based arbitration body’s July 2025 order to refrain from confiscating the utility pending a verdict in the case brought by Karapetian’s Tashir Group. The authorities ignored the injunction anyway.
“I am the government ... no one can have a position that contradicts my position,” Pashinian declared the day before the announcement of Drmeyan’s sacking.
Pashinian lashed out at Drmeyan on Thursday, branding him as Karapetian’s “Trojan horse” inside his government and demanding that law-enforcement authorities investigate his activities. Drmeyan was quick to deny the allegations not backed up by any evidence. He linked them to the fact that he ran in the June 7 parliamentary elections on the opposition Wings of Unity party’s ticket and alleged serious fraud afterwards.
“The statements made yesterday were untrue and also defamatory of my honor and dignity, and I have filed a lawsuit to oblige [Pashinian] to refute the defamatory information,” the former official told reporters on Friday.
Armenia’s Office of the Prosecutor-General was quick to pledge to act on Pashinian’s claims. Drmeyan was not charged with any crime or interrogated over the next 24 hours.
The Wings of Unity is led by former human rights ombudsman Arman Tatoyan. It did not collaborate with Karapetian’s Strong Armenia bloc before or after the elections. Tatoyan even criticized the tycoon during the election campaign.
In a statement issued late on Thursday, Tatoyan condemned Pashinian’s “political order to prosecute” Drmeyan and pledged to use “all legal mechanisms and instances” to defend his political ally.