Before the 2020 war, Armenia celebrated the Yerkrapah and the liberation of Shushi on May 8. On May 8, 2018, Nikol Pashinyan was elected Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia for the first time during a special session of the National Assembly, marking a victory for the Velvet Revolution. On May 8, 2026, the campaign for the June 7 National Assembly elections began, and the country will remain in an undeclared state of emergency until the end of the campaign. The ministers from the Civil Contract party went on vacation to participate in the campaign, which resulted in the cancellation of the previous Government-National Assembly question-and-answer session, and the upcoming session will not take place either.<\/p>\n
19 political forces are participating in the elections.<\/p>\n
Before the campaign had even began, the Armenia alliance produced a two-part biographical feature film about Robert Kocharyan, subtitled “As I Am.” In addition to daily meetings, the campaign is promoted through reels and short clips from the film. The campaign’s slogan is “It is time to reject lies and deception together.” On the first day of the campaign, the Armenia Alliance held a rally in Vagharshapat centred around this theme.<\/p>\n
The Armenia alliance is one of the “heads” of the “three-headed war monster” described by Nikol Pashinyan, alongside Strong Armenia and “Prosperous Armenia. On May 9, Kocharyan responded to this in Yerablur, stating, “The three-headed monster is Pashinyan, along with Aliyev and Erdogan.”<\/p>\n
Logically, the Strong Armenia campaign should have started in Echmiadzin. The phrase “in our way,” expressed in the courtyard of the Mother See, led to the imprisonment of a Russian businessman and marked his announcement of his entry into politics. However, on May 8, the Strong Armenia team and their supporters gathered at Victory Park in the evening. It soon became clear why they were there: they planned to visit Samvel Karapetyan after the gathering, as his mansion is located near the park.<\/p>\n
With the announcement of “Prime Minister Samvel Karapetyan,” the doors of the mansion were ceremoniously opened, and Karapetyan emerged, dressed in white, along with his wife. He delivered a brief speech to the crowd, which particularly drew attention for his reference to a “victory march,” a phrase that became a topic of discussion online.<\/p>\n
“Vic-to-ry”, “Adven-turous-ness”, Nikol Pashinyan even manages to film reels between election rallies. This time, he chanted and repeated the words that Samvel Karapetyan and Robert Kocharyan mispronounced.<\/p>\n
Nikol Pashinyan began his campaign in Syunik. During his meetings, he distributed a brochure outlining the government’s achievements, a model showcasing the vision for a real Armenia, and cookies wrapped in heart-shaped packaging. In Gorayk, he highlighted the introduction of health insurance as an “epic change.” Minister Avanesyan added, “Don\u2019t listen to the opponents; the system will continue functioning after the elections.”<\/p>\n
The primary propagandist for the Civil Contract party is Nikol Pashinyan. He is the only one who actively asks questions, listens, provides comments, and offers answers.<\/p>\n
Radio Liberty commented on the first day of the campaign, recalling what Pashinyan had stated before the 2021 and 2026 elections: the topic was the Karabakh issue<\/a>.<\/p>\n Bright Armenia held a press conference yesterday, where they presented their campaign song, emblem, and slogan: “Protect Your Identity.” They launched their campaign in Yeraskh, at the site of a metallurgical plant that was never built due to Azerbaijani shelling. Their goal was to illustrate Azerbaijan’s interference in Armenia\u2019s domestic political affairs. “There will be a ‘remontada’, a return to our roots,” announced Karpis Pashoyan.<\/p>\n Arman Tatoyan’s party, Wings of Unity, is represented under ballot number 6. The team has drawn this number, while the opposing party, the Civil Contract, has drawn number 16. Beneath Tatoyan’s picture, which can be seen throughout Yerevan, the slogan reads, “Justice is coming.” In a brief clip released on May 8, Tatoyan is seen getting into a car and driving away. The car collides with the number 16 standing in front of it, damaging the 1 and leaving only the 6 intact. “Let’s say the campaign has kicked off with this reel<\/a>,” Tatoyan wrote.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Before the 2020 war, Armenia celebrated the Yerkrapah and the liberation of Shushi on May 8. On May 8, 2018, Nikol Pashinyan was elected Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia for the first time during a special session of the National Assembly, marking a victory for the Velvet Revolution. On May 8, 2026, the Read the full article…<\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":186,"featured_media":46014,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[27,212],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-46078","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-crossroads","category-featured-post","author_posts-mariam-barseghyan-en"],"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46078","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/186"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=46078"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46078\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":46080,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/46078\/revisions\/46080"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/46014"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=46078"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=46078"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/media.am\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=46078"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}