Nikol Pashinyan

Nikol Pashinyan

Nikol Vovayi Pashinyan (; born 1 June 1975) is an Armenian politician serving as Prime Minister of Armenia since 8 May 2018. A prominent journalist and editor, he first founded his own newspaper in 1998 which was shut down a year later. He led a minor opposition party in the 2007 parliamentary election, garnering 1. 3% of the vote. He later broke from Ter-Petrosyan’s broad opposition coalition, the Armenian National Congress, in 2012. Along with two other opposition parties, he formed the Way Out Alliance which garnered almost 8% of the vote in the 2017 parliamentary election.

About Nikol Pashinyan in brief

Summary Nikol PashinyanNikol Vovayi Pashinyan (; born 1 June 1975) is an Armenian politician serving as Prime Minister of Armenia since 8 May 2018. A prominent journalist and editor, he first founded his own newspaper in 1998 which was shut down a year later. He was sentenced for one year for defamation against then Minister of National Security Serzh Sargsyan. He edited Haykakan Zhamanak from 1999 to 2012. He led a minor opposition party in the 2007 parliamentary election, garnering 1. 3% of the vote. He later broke from Ter-Petrosyan’s broad opposition coalition, the Armenian National Congress, in 2012. Along with two other opposition parties, he formed the Way Out Alliance which garnered almost 8% of the vote in the 2017 parliamentary election. On 1 May 2018, he failed to gain enough votes from the Parliament to become the Prime Minister himself, but was elected in the second vote on 8 May. In June 2020, he announced that he and his whole family will isolate themselves at the COVID-19 pandemic in Armenia during the PM’s Residence in Armenia in June 2020. He is married to Anna Hakobyan, a journalist whom he met at YSU. They have three daughters and a son. He has volunteered to serve in Artsakh in 2018 in his native Armenian, Russian, English, French and French. He did not serve in the Armenian Army because his two elder brothers served before him and he was not obliged to serve by law.

His paternal grandfather died in World War II. He served in the 554th Rifle Regiment of the 138th Rifle Division and died in 1943. His mother Svetlana died when he was 12 and he is mostly raised by his stepmother, Yerjanik, who was Vova’s second wife. He was expelled from the university just before graduation for his criticism of the YSU leadership. In a 2015 interview he stated that he considers himself more of a journalist because journalism brought him into politics. He said that he hopes they can get married at an Armenian Apostolic Church one day. His father worked as a football and volleyball coach and as a physical education teacher. At least one of his grandparents was from the village of Yenokavan, around 10 kilometres from Ijevan, in the northeastern province of Tavush. He is named after his paternal grandfather who died in WW2. His mother died when she was just 12 and his father was a football coach and a Physical Education teacher. He does not have a church ceremony, nor did they have a wedding ceremony. He and his family are adherents of the Holy Etchmiadzin Catholic Church. He also has a son, Ashot, who he hopes can serve in his father’s Artsakh Artsakh Volunteer Corps in 2018. He says that he wants to visit the Mother of the faithful from time to time to reflect on the past and the future.