"Zhoghovurd" daily writes:
"Political pressures against the Holy Armenian Apostolic Church and the Catholicos of All Armenians, started by Prime Minister of Armenia Nikol Pashinyan, are gaining a new form and content every day. According to the government sources of "Zhoghovurd" daily, the government is systematically trying to find representatives within the church who are ready to cooperate with the government and, if necessary, to oppose Catholicos of All Armenians Garegin II from within.
According to the same sources, Prime Minister Pashinyan has already managed to gain the loyalty of Navasard Archbishop Kchoyan, leader of the Ararat Patriarchal Diocese, and the issue of convening an episcopal meeting is being discussed in the near future, where the aim is to raise the topic of the Catholicos in a closed format.
However, in order for the process to appear "legal" and "logical" from the outside, in the first stage, it is planned to examine the question of those bishops and clerics, who have been or are being asked internally about violating the rules of celibacy, suspicions about their personal life. Several clerics have already been targeted and, as the sources of "Zhoghovurd" daily assure, they will try to put forward an initiative from within the church with the agenda of stopping their service.
"Zhoghovurd" daily newspaper will continue to follow these processes, recording how the tense relationship between the state government and the church is moving step by step from secret negotiations to the danger of an open intra-church crisis.
Details in today's issue of "Zhoghovurd" daily.
