The visit was made possible by a judge presiding over the ongoing trial of Archbishop Mikael Ajapahian, the primate of a church diocese encompassing Armenia’s northwestern Shirak province. The judge granted last week defense lawyers’ request to allow individuals other than journalists to meet him at a prison in downtown Yerevan.
Father Yesayi Artenian, a spokesman for the church’s Mother See in Echmiadzin, confirmed Garegin’s conversation with Ajapajhian on Wednesday.
“His Holiness had previously expressed a desire to visit Monsignors Michael and Bagrat [Galstanian] as well as national benefactor Samvel Karapetian,” Artenian told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service. “Unfortunately, he was refused.”
In a separate statement, the Mother See again strongly condemned the “illegal” criminal proceedings against the three men.
Archbishop Mikayel Ajapahian greets supporters during his trial in Yerevan, August 28, 2025.
They were prosecuted as Pashinian stepped up his efforts to depose Garegin and other senior clergymen. Billionaire Karapetian was arrested and charged with calling for a violent regime change on June 18 hours after condemning Pashinian’s campaign. Galstanian was taken into custody along with 15 supporters on June 25. They went on trial last month on what they call politically motivated charges of plotting “terrorist acts” in a bid to seize power.
On June 26, Pashinian threatened to forcibly remove Garegin from Echmiadzin if the Catholicos continues to ignore his demands. Security forces raided the Mother See the next morning in a bid to arrest Archbishop Ajapahian. But they failed to do that after meeting with fierce resistance from hundreds of angry priests and laymen.
Ajapahian surrendered to investigators several hours after the unprecedented raid. He was charged with calling for a violent overthrow of the government, an accusation he and other critics of Pashinian reject as politically motivated.
Masked officers of the National Security Service are confronted by angry followers of the Armenian Apostolic Church in Echmiadzin, June 27, 2025.
The case against Ajapahian is based on a 2024 interview in which the archbishop highly critical of the Armenian government discussed the need for a coup d’etat in the country. The Office of the Prosecutor-General concluded at the time that his remarks do not warrant criminal charges. It now says that he was prosecuted for making a similar statement in June this year.
Ajapahian’s trial began on August 15 and is already nearing its end. Defense lawyers say the unusually fast pace of the trial is a further indication that the court is guided by government orders. If convicted, Ajapahian will face up to five years in prison. He has remained defiant during the court hearings, saying that he is not afraid of lengthy imprisonment.
Pashinian insisted on August 28 that he has not abandoned his efforts to oust Garegin despite a backlash from opposition groups and other supporters of the church. He accuses the Catholicos of having fathered a child in breach of his vows of celibacy. The premier’s detractors say that he is simply trying to please Azerbaijan and/or neutralize a key source of opposition to his unilateral concessions to Armenia’s arch-foe.
Garegin again slammed Azerbaijan on September 4, accusing it of destroying Armenian churches in Nagorno-Karabakh and decrying the “illegal” captivity of the region’s former leaders.
