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TBILISI: Six Armenian clergymen were detained on Wednesday, their lawyer said, amid a widening crackdown that has seen some religious figures accused of plotting coups in the South Caucasus country.
Five priests belonging to the Aragatsotn diocese of the Apostolic Church in western Armenia as well as its most senior figure, Bishop Mkrtich Proshyan, were brought into custody following searches of their homes, lawyer Ara Zograbyan wrote on Facebook. A number of civilians were also arrested, he said.
Armenian authorities have not yet published statements on the detentions. The Investigative Committee, the judiciary’s main investigative arm, did not immediately respond to a request for comment.
The arrests of the six come after another pastor at a church in the same region gave an interview last month on public television alleging that the Apostolic Church had forced its members to participate in anti-government rallies in 2021 against Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan.
An Armenian non-profit group, the Union of Informed Citizens, subsequently filed a request to state prosecutors to investigate the claim by the pastor, Father Ter Aram.
A senior council of the Apostolic Church condemned Wednesday’s arrests as showcasing the government’s “systemic pressure on the Armenian Church,” according to a statement cited by Armenian media.
The confrontation between the government and the Church comes as Pashinyan faces parliamentary elections next June and is under domestic pressure to conclude a peace agreement with Azerbaijan to end decades of conflict between the South Caucasus neighbors.
The crackdown on the clergy began this summer with the arrests of several prominent clerics on charges of attempts to incite violent coups.
One of them, Archbishop Mikael Ajapahyan, was sentenced to two years in prison earlier this month following what the Apostolic Church called a politically-motivated trial.
Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, another jailed cleric who is awaiting trial, led street protests against Pashinyan last year over what he cast as territorial concessions made to Azerbaijan following wars in 2020 and 2023.
Some senior clerics have previously called for Pashinyan to step down over Armenia’s military defeats against Azerbaijan.

ANTANANARIVO: Madagascar’s military coup leader said Wednesday that he is “taking the position of president” in an interview at his barracks.

Col. Michael Randrianirina, who led a rebellion by soldiers that ousted President Andry Rajoelina, said he expects to be sworn in as the Indian Ocean country’s new leader in the next few days.

Randrianirina announced Tuesday that the armed forces were taking power in Madagascar, capping weeks of protests against Rajoelina and his government by mainly youth groups.

He said he is taking the role as head of state after the country’s High Constitutional Court invited him to do so in the absence of Rajoelina, who fled Madagascar following the uprising.

“There must be an oath-taking” to make his position official, Randrianirina said.

The protests reached a turning point on Saturday when Randrianirina and soldiers from his elite CAPSAT military unit rebelled against Rajoelina and joined demonstrations calling for the president to step down, forcing Rajoelina to flee.

“We had to take responsibility yesterday because there is nothing left in the country, no president, no president in the senate, no government,” Randrianirina said.

Rajoelina, who has been president since 2018, said he had fled to a safe place in fear for his life after the rebellion by Randrianirina’s soldiers. He has rejected the military takeover as an illegal coup attempt by a rebel faction.

Randrianirina said the new military leadership would quickly appoint a new prime minister who would form a government, but didn’t give an exact time frame for that to happen.

“What I can say is that we are already accelerating it so that the crisis in the country does not last forever,” the colonel said.

Madagascans have seen their country roiled by several coups and attempted coups since gaining independence from France in 1960. The Indian Ocean island has also struggled with high levels of poverty ever since.

A 2009 military-led coup brought Rajoelina to power as a transitional leader, when the president had cast himself as a champion of the youth.

There was no significant immediate reaction to the takeover by the international community or the African Union, which had called an emergency meeting for its security council on Tuesday.

Some analysts have described the weekslong youth uprising in Madagascar as an expression of grievances over government failures and condemned the military takeover.

“Gen-Zers in Madagascar have been on the streets of the country protesting the lack of essential services, especially water and electricity, and the negative impact on their lives for almost a month,” said Olufemi Taiwo, professor of Africana studies at Cornell University. “This is a civil society uprising and its resolution should not involve the military.”

He called for the African Union to condemn another coup that Africa “does not need,” adding that no country should recognize the new military leadership.