Ruben Melikian has taught law at Yerevan State University (YSU) for the last 23 years. Melikian says that its pro-government rector, Hovannes Hovannisian, notified him earlier this week that his part-time employment contract will not be renewed in September. Hovannisian did not explain the decision, according to him.
“I believe that this is a result of my human rights advocacy,” Melikian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service on Friday.
A vocal critic of the Armenian government, Melikian has represented arrested opposition activists throughout Pashinian’s eight-year rule. He linked this removal from YSU to a wave of arrests of Armenian opposition leaders, members and supporters which continued after last month’s disputed parliamentary elections.
The YSU administration has still not commented on the sacking. Contacted by RFE/RL’s Armenian Service, Hovannisian declined to say whether Melikian was indeed pushed out because of his views and activities. The rector represented the ruling Civil Contract party in the Armenian parliament before taking over the country’s largest and oldest university.
Melikian said that two other YSU lecturers at odds with the government were also dismissed in recent days. One of them, political scientist Alen Ghulian, is currently under arrest on what he sees as politically motivated charges, while the other, Shushan Vartanian, could not be reached for comment on Friday.
The main building of Yerevan State University.
Last month, the YSU administration controversially abolished the university’s Foreign Literature Chair headed by Anush Sedrakian, another Pashinian critic. It denied any political reasons for the move.
Later in June, a state college in the town of Armavir sacked its administrator and lecturer Hayastan Hakobian who ran in the June 7 as a candidate of the main opposition Strong Armenia alliance. Hakobian pledged to challenge her dismissal in court, saying that she lost her job “due to my political views.” The college director denied that.
Quite a few other individuals holding managerial positions in the public sector have reportedly also been told to resign or sacked in recent months because of being related to oppositionists or critical of the government. They include Lilit Ghazarian, the sister of another Strong Armenia member who ran for the parliament.
Ghazarian served as deputy head of the Armenian government’s drug regulatory agency for 22 years. She said that her boss told her to resign for “known reasons” the day after the June 7 elections. She said she refused before being notified that her position has been abolished.
Around the same time, a local government employee in a northern Armenian village claimed to have been forced to resign because of dismissing as misleading the official election results in her community.
Vartan Harutiunian, a civic activist and Soviet-era dissident, suggested that these dismissals are part of an ongoing “political persecution of people with opposition views.”
“As it turned out, what the people fought against [during the ‘velvet revolution’] in 2018 is still happening today,” said Harutiunian. “It looks like we are going to need another year 2018.”
