Armenian PM Pashinyan says army chief of staff dismissed

The PM had accused Onik Gasparyan of leading a coup attempt after he joined protest calls for the leader to quit.

A top military figure who joined calls for Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan to resign has been relieved of his duties, the embattled leader said, according to Russian news agency RIA. Pashinyan announced the move in a statement published on the Cabinet of Ministers’ official website on Wednesday, days after Armenian President Armen Sarkissian refused to sign the premier’s draft decree to dismiss Onik Gasparyan, the army’s chief of the General Staff The statement said the because Sarkissian had not sent documentation pertaining to his rejection of Gasparyan’s dismissal to the Constitutional Court, the chief of staff was therefore automatically “relieved of his post from March 10 by force of law”.