By Siranush Adamyan
Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan publicly called on Wednesday for an investigation into Liparit Drmeyan, the former head of the Office of the Representative on International Legal Matters, accusing him of serving the interests of a private company while working inside the government.
Speaking to reporters after a Cabinet meeting, Pashinyan urged the Corruption Prevention Commission and law enforcement agencies to examine Drmeyan's assets and financial records. He said he was filing a public crime report, adding that he did not wish to violate the presumption of innocence.
The accusations stem from the government's dispute with the owners of Electric Networks of Armenia (ENA), who have sought international arbitration after the government started nationalization of the country's electricity distribution company. Pashinyan alleged that a "Trojan horse" had been operating within the state apparatus, referring to Drmeyan.
According to the prime minister, Drmeyan leaked information to political actors and media outlets and drafted legal opinions that contradicted both the government's position and his own instructions.
"How could it turn out that someone serving the interests of a private company was working in this building?" Pashinyan said.
Shortly after the remarks, Armenia's Prosecutor General's Office said it had opened proceedings based on the prime minister's verbal report.
The dispute follows a sharp disagreement over whether Armenia should comply with an emergency ruling issued by a Stockholm arbitration tribunal in the ENA case.
In July 2025, the Office of the Representative on International Legal Matters stated that the tribunal's emergency orders were legally binding. Pashinyan responded by saying officials who believed the ruling had to be enforced on behalf of the government should resign. Drmeyan was dismissed from his post on August 29, 2025.
Pashinyan also linked Drmeyan's subsequent political activity to his allegations, noting that the former official later ran in the June 7 parliamentary election on the list of the Wings of Unity party. He questioned whether Drmeyan's political affiliation and alleged conduct while in office were connected.
In a Facebook post later on Thursday, Drmeyan rejected the allegations, saying the claims "have nothing to do with reality" and that Pashinyan would eventually be forced to retract them. "I acted in the interests of one entity, and that entity is the Republic of Armenia," he wrote.
Drmeyan argued that the accusations came in response to his recent political activity and, in particular, to legal arguments his team presented before Armenia's Constitutional Court challenging the conduct of the parliamentary elections. He said those submissions demonstrated that the ruling Civil Contract party had relied on "financial, administrative and repressive" measures throughout the election campaign.
Referring to Pashinyan as "the 'I am the government' man"—a reference to the prime minister's earlier declaration that "I am the government"—Drmeyan concluded: "Justice and the rule of law will prevail, and the public will see that 'you are not the government.'"
The dispute over ENA is part of a broader confrontation between Pashinyan and Russian-Armenian billionaire Samvel Karapetyan, whose Tashir Group controls the utility. The conflict escalated in June 2025 after Karapetyan publicly defended the Armenian Apostolic Church amid an intensifying dispute between the government and senior clergy.
Authorities subsequently arrested Karapetyan on charges of calling for the overthrow of the constitutional order, allegations he denies, while the government moved to nationalize ENA, citing the need to protect the public interest. Karapetyan later entered politics, emerging as Pashinyan's main challenger. His Strong Armenia alliance won second place in the June 2026 parliamentary elections and is now the largest opposition faction in the National Assembly.
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