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Moscow Plots to Mobilize 100,000 Russia Based Armenians to Vote Out Prime Minister Pashinyan
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Russia has launched a coordinated covert campaign to prevent Armenia from pivoting toward the West, deploying a voter-transport operation, disinformation networks, and threats against Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan ahead of parliamentary elections, Reuters reported on May 29.
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The investigation, drawing on five Western officials and documentary evidence, identifies the Kremlin's newly established Directorate for Strategic Cooperation and Partnership as the body overseeing the effort.
Russian authorities calculated the cost at approximately $50 million to transport around 100,000 Russia-based Armenians across the border to cast ballots against Pashinyan, three sources indicated. By mid-May, the Kremlin had issued regional quotas and instructed administrators to report on preparations, those officials added.
Moscow's preferred candidate, three of the sources noted, is Samvel Karapetyan, a billionaire currently on trial for allegedly calling for the overthrow of the Armenian government. Karapetyan, who is Armenian-Russian, denies the charges.
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The disinformation component involves the Social Design Agency (SDA), a Moscow-based PR firm already sanctioned by the US, UK, and EU for its links to Kremlin influence operations.
Reuters reviewed five Russian-language documents that the sources attributed to SDA. One proposed creating a media outlet called Yerevan1, built around the premise that Armenia could prosper only within a close alliance with Russia.
A Kremlin-affiliated bot network known as Storm-1516, previously linked to US election interference efforts, is also reportedly active in the campaign. Russia's foreign ministry dismissed the allegations, telling reporters that claims of interference in Armenia's internal affairs were unfounded.
"What Pashinyan is trying to do is a threat to Russia," Thomas de Waal, senior fellow at Carnegie Europe, told Reuters. He warned that diversification of Armenia's alliances threatened Russia's long-held monopoly on influence in the country.
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Pashinyan has accelerated Armenia's westward shift since taking office in 2018, reaching a US-brokered peace agreement with Azerbaijan over Nagorno-Karabakh last August and suspending participation in Moscow's regional security alliance in 2024. This month, Armenia hosted NATO's chief at a European leaders’ summit.
US President Donald Trump endorsed Pashinyan's re-election bid on May 28. Secretary of State Marco Rubio flew to Yerevan this week, signing a minerals deal and an agreement on the Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity, a proposed transport corridor through Armenia.
Three Western officials, including a senior US official, described serious and ongoing concerns about Pashinyan's physical safety. A video circulating online in May showed masked men threatening to kill him; Armenian authorities are investigating the case.
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Elements of the US government, including the CIA, have covertly aided Pashinyan's personal protection in recent years, according to three sources with knowledge of the arrangement.
A recent poll suggested Pashinyan's Civil Contract party leads with approximately 30% of the vote, against roughly 6% for Karapetyan's Strong Armenia party in a crowded field.
Russia's disinformation offensive against Pashinyan predates the current election cycle by months.
As early as March, fabricated social media videos began circulating with claims that a Pashinyan electoral victory would trigger armed conflict with Russia, with some clips falsely imitating reporting from established Western analytical institutions.
The campaign recruited US television actors through the Cameo platform, deploying them to promote manufactured narratives about a secret Pashinyan-France deal aimed at provoking Moscow.
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