Conflict coverage · South Caucasus

Armenia's Velvet Revolution

Apr – May 2018Key eventYerevan

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Military & security

Effects & resilience

PoliticalLeadership changeArmenia–Azerbaijan / Karabakh legacy

Mass protests led by Nikol Pashinyan force Serzh Sargsyan's resignation weeks after he moved from president to prime minister; Pashinyan is elected premier in May. The change is domestic — anti-corruption, anti-incumbency — not geopolitical, but it ends the rule of the Karabakh-war military elite.

Why it mattersMoscow distrusted the street-born government from the start, and the removal of the Karabakh old guard changed Yerevan's relationship to the conflict itself — a leadership with no personal stake in the 1994 victory would eventually be the one to negotiate after its loss.

Confidence: HighSources: Established historical recordMethodology Corrections

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Armenia

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