Two Armenian Officials Waste Taxpayers’ Money on a Useless Trip to Los Angeles — By Harut Sassounian

Instead of working to improve the disastrous situation in Armenia and strengthening the homeland’s security, Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan is busy alienating the Armenian Diaspora.

Pashinyan sent two of his top officials to Los Angeles last week ostensibly to “counter the disinformation” emanating from Armenians in the United States: Lilit Makunts, Pashinyan’s Chief Advisor and former Ambassador to the U.S., and his Chief of Staff, Arayik Harutyunyan. Rather than countering “disinformation”, they were in fact disseminating “disinformation” about conditions in Armenia. They not only wasted their time, but more importantly, wasted the Armenian taxpayers’ money.

Here are some of the mistakes this duo made during their visit:

1) They spoke to a small gathering of Armenians at the Armenian Society of Los Angeles in Glendale on February 18. Since no announcement was made about their arrival, almost no one from the community knew that they were in town. There were no notices in the Armenian media about their appearance. If they concealed the news of their visit fearing protests or criticism, then they should not have come at all. An indication of their paranoia was the fact that they had invited only a handful of their followers and stationed two people at the entrance to ensure that no unwelcome guests would show up.

2) If their intent was to counter the anti-Armenia “disinformation campaign”:

a) Why didn’t they hold their meeting in a much larger hall so their message could be heard by thousands of local Armenians instead of just one hundred? Shockingly, I was told that not even the local Armenian Consul General attended.

b) Why didn’t they invite the media to the briefing?

c) Why didn’t they hold a press conference with the Armenian media to spread their message to the community? If they can’t face the Armenian media, how will they be able to confront Armenia’s real enemies?

d) On April 1, 2025, Armenia hired the U.S. lobbying firm Mercury Public Affairs for a monthly fee of $50,000. The contract signed by then-Ambassador Makunts stated that Mercury was to provide to Armenia “strategic communications and media relations services.” Why would Armenia pay a professional firm the large sum of $50,000 a month and not use its services? Mercury could have easily organized the press conference for both the American and Armenia media, and arranged meetings with government officials and leaders of Armenian and American organizations.

e) Another mistake Makunts and Harutyunyan made was leaving off their U.S. itinerary Zareh Sinanyan — the so-called High Commissioner for the Armenian Diaspora, who is supposed to be in charge of Armenia’s relations with the Diaspora. If Zareh had any backbone, he would have submitted his resignation that same day. However, the real fault lies with Pashinyan, who lacks the experience to run a government. Otherwise, he would have not hired someone like Zareh who is so unqualified. Sadly, an incompetent Prime Minister appoints equally incompetent officials. Furthermore, Pashinyan appointed Makunts as ambassador to the U.S., even though she lacked the necessary experience for such a post in the world’s most important capital. She served for four years as ambassador to Washington, rarely meeting with government officials. Instead of dismissing her, Pashinyan rewarded her with the high post of Chief Advisor to the Prime Minister. This is a case of the blind leading the blind. Her only notable accomplishment was teaching Pashinyan some English.

f) Regrettably, neither Makunts nor any other Armenian official said a word about Vice President JD Vance’s deletion of the term Armenian Genocide from his Twitter (X) post after visiting the Armenian Genocide Memorial in Yerevan two weeks ago. Last week, when asked by FOX-TV to comment on Vance’s offensive deletion, Makunts “declined to comment.” Furthermore, she described Turkey as a country with which “we have had a very difficult history!”

I became aware of an even stranger situation last week when I learned that Anna Hakobyan, the Prime Minister’s partner, had flown from Qatar via Los Angeles to Fort Worth, Texas, where she visited the Buddhist monks’ Huong Dao Vipassana Bhavana Center. In a video she posted on Facebook, she made tearful remarks comparing the Buddhist monks’ 2,500-mile “Walk for Peace” across the United States to Pashinyan’s march from Gyumri to Yerevan in 2018. She posted a video of herself walking with “the Peace Dog, Aloka,” who accompanied the monks just as Chalo, the Armenian dog, she said, accompanied Pashinyan during his celebrated march.

Hakobyan also posted a puzzling comment on Facebook last week saying: “The civil marriage of Prime Minister Pashinyan and I is over.” Some people interpreted this message as an announcement of separation, while others thought the couple finally got married in some kind of ceremony after decades of living together and having four children. A year ago, Pashinyan announced on Facebook that he and Anna had neither a church wedding nor a civil marriage. I wish the newlyweds much happiness.