Armenian PM Triggers Early Election a Day after Biden's Genocide Announcement

MOSCOW - Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan, who was swept to power in pro-democracy protests in 2018, triggered an early election on Sunday to try overcome criticism over his handling of last year's conflict in Nagorno-Karabakh.   

His resignation, which was expected, came a day after U.S. President Joe Biden said that massacres of Armenians in the Ottoman Empire in 1915 constituted genocide, a move welcomed by Armenians worldwide and condemned by Turkey.   Pashinyan told Biden the symbolic decision was a matter of security to Armenia after the six week conflict over Nagorno-Karabakh, in which Turkey backed Armenia's neighbor Azerbaijan, where the ethnic Armenian-populated enclave is located.   Pashinyan had been under pressure to resign since he agreed to a cease-fire after ethnic Armenians lost territory in the fighting with Azeri forces in and around Nagorno-Karabakh.