Aravot has been based at a 15-story building that had been constructed to house most of Soviet Armenia’s newspapers and magazines. The structure known as the Press Building also provided office space to some of the new and privately owned publications that mushroomed in the country following the Soviet collapse. The country’s former governments allowed them to rent it at largely symbolic prices.
Aravot was among a handful of media outlets that still operated from the building as of last month, with the bulk of it now occupied by various businesses. A government agency issued an eviction order to the daily after refusing in late June to extend the most recent lease agreement signed with it 2013.
Citing a government decision, the State Property Management Committee said it will now rent out all Press Building offices at only market-based rates. The committee rejected on July 28 the paper’s request to let it temporarily stay in the building until finding new premises.
A view of the Press Building in Yerevan, August 1, 2025.
“As far as we know, Aravot is currently the only entity that has been told to vacate the premises within a short period of time,” the paper wrote last Thursday. “We do not want to harm our colleagues who remain in the Press Building. Let us be the only ones [evicted from it.] But the State Property [Management Committee] must at least stop trying to lie.”
Aravot, which also has a news website, is not linked to any Armenian political faction and is known for its neutral coverage of political developments in the country. Still, its founder and editor-in-chief, Aram Abrahamyan, has grown increasingly critical of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian in his editorials and social media posts. Pashinian himself is a former newspaper editor.
Aravot staff were busy on Friday packing their belongings and preparing to leave the premises. The paper has not yet found a new office, meaning that its journalists will work from home for the time being.
“They say that there should be no press in the Press Building which was built specifically for the press,” one of them, Gohar Hakobian, told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service.
