by Manishak Baghdasaryan and Melisa Gevorgyan
Armenia’s Prosecutor General’s Office is seeking to invalidate a 2019 donation agreement that transferred buildings and land from the Ministry of Defense to the Armenian Apostolic Church. This legal claim, filed on July 30, 2025, with Anti-Corruption Court, questions the legitimacy of the state’s earlier decision and accuses them of violating legal norms.
Notably this move comes amid a period of political unrest in the country, during which several representatives of the Armenian Apostolic Church have been detained or subjected to investigation, casting further doubts on the motives behind this sudden legal scrutiny.
The Prosecutor’s Office alleges that the donation of nearly 9,500 square meters of state-owned buildings and 8.9 hectares of land to the Church in Getahovit village, Tavush Province, was not conducted in accordance with legislative requirements. Citing a 2018 government decision made under then-Prime Minister Karen Karapetyan, the Office now demands that the transaction be annulled and its legal consequences reversed.
The situation in Aparan is even more complex. There, the Prosecutor’s office has joined the local municipal council in challenging the legal status of churches that were built without formal authorization in the villages of Yeghipatrush and Ernjatap. In 2019, these churches were recognized as community property and subsequently donated to the Armenian Apostolic Church. The Prosecutor’s Office claims these actions were unlawful, as churches are considered historical-cultural monuments and thus, allegedly, inalienable.
The irony here is that the same government that signed off on the property transfer in 2018 and 2019 is now trying to dismantle it years later, calling it “inalienable”. This clearly shows the motives of the current administration may be less about legal consistency but rather about reasserting control over the Church, an institution which has historically had autonomy and influence in Armenia.
By targeting the Armenian Apostolic Church, the state appears to be sending a message not just about property, but about power. In a time when public trust is already fraying, this selective legal revisionism risks deepening social divisions and portraying the Church as a scapegoat for broader political failures. Rather than building national unity through respect for the institutions that have shaped Armenian identity for centuries, the state appears to be targeting them in court.
