Biography

Born on June 1, 1975 in Idjevan, he graduated from Idjevan Secondary School N1.

In 1991-1995, he studied at the Yerevan State University. In the fifth year of graduation, he was dismissed from the YSU for political reasons.

Since 1992, he had been actively engaged in journalism. He was on the staff of Dprutyun, Hayastan, Lragir, Lragir-Or and Molorak newspapers. In 1998, he founded Oragir daily, which was closed down by a court decision in 1999 for political reasons.

In 1999, he was appointed editor-in-chief of Haykakan Zhamanak daily and held the post until 2012.

In August, 1999, he was sentenced to one year in prison for political motives. Later, at the request of international and Armenian journalists, the Court of Appeals delayed the imprisonment for a year. As a result, the imprisonment was never enforced.

In 2007, he was founding member of Alternative public-political association. He headed the proportional list of Impeachment alliance in the parliamentary elections of 2007.

During the 2008 presidential election, he was member of presidential candidate Levon Ter-Petrosyan’s campaign headquarters.

For a year following March 1, 2008, he was wanted by the Police and spent four months in hiding. On July 1, 2009, he came out of hiding and surrendered himself to the Office of General Prosecutor, where he was arrested and sentenced to seven years in January 2010 on charges of organizing mass disorders on March 1, 2008.

He has been widely recognized as a prisoner of conscience in Armenia and by the international community. After spending one year and 11 months in prison, he was released on May 27, 2011 by virtue of the general amnesty declared by the Armenian authorities.

In the general elections of 2012, he was elected to the National Assembly by the proportional list of the Armenian National Congress Alliance. In 2012-13, he was Chairman of the NA Ethics Committee.

In 2013, he founded the Civil Contract public-political association. From 2013 to 2015, he was on the governing board of Civil Contract public-political association. Since 2015, he has been a board member of Civil Contract party. In May 2016, he was the commander of Civil Contract party volunteer detachment.

He was elected to the National Assembly by the electoral list of Yelk Bloc in the general elections of April 2, 2017 from Constituency N4, which covered Kentron, Erebuni, Nork-Marash and Nubarashen administrative districts of Yerevan.

From May, 2017, he headed National Assembly’s Yelk parliamentary faction.

On March 31, 2018, he initiated and led the My Move movement from Vardanants Square in Gyumri, which resulted in a non-violent velvet revolution in April and May of the same year.

On May 8, 2018, at the request of the Popular Movement, he was elected Prime Minister by the National Assembly of the Republic of Armenia.

On October 16, 2018, in compliance with the pre-election pledge, he resigned from the office of Prime Minister in anticipation of snap parliamentary elections, and exercised the duties of Acting Prime Minister. Nikol Pashinyan headed the My Step alliance during the elections.

On December 9, 2018, the My Step alliance won about 70 percent of the votes in the parliamentary elections.

On January 14, 2019, in accordance with Article 149 (1) of the Constitution of the Republic of Armenia, Nikol Pashinyan was appointed to the post of Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia in the manner prescribed by Article 89 of the Constitution.

Nikol Pashinyan is married. He has three daughters and a son.