YEREVAN, March 1. /TASS/. Another rally in support of Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan has begun on Yerevan’s central square, in front of the government building, a TASS correspondent reports from the site.

Pashinyan is expected to address the rally.

 

Mass rallies by Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s supporters and opponents engulfed the South Caucasian nation on Thursday after Armenia’s General Staff had issued a statement demanding the the prime minister and the government step down. Pashinyan slammed that move by the top brass as an attempted military coup and announced a decision to sack the chief of the General Staff.

Armenia’s President Armen Sarkissian, who is authorized by the national constitution to appoint and dismiss the chief of the General Staff at the prime minister’s behest, on Saturday refused to sign the decree removing the general. After that, Pashinyan sent back the decree to the president and called on his followers to converge on Yerevan’s central square on March 1.​

The president now has three days to either sign the decree or challenge it with the Constitutional Court.