About Haykakan Zhamanak

Haykakan Zhamanak

Haykakan Zhamanak, known in English as Armenian Times, is one of the most politically significant newspapers in Armenia's post-Soviet history. Published in Yerevan from 1999, it was founded and edited by journalist Nikol Pashinyan, who later led the 2018 Velvet Revolution and became Prime Minister of Armenia. For years it was the country's best-known opposition daily, famous for hard-hitting coverage of Presidents Robert Kocharyan and Serzh Sargsyan and their circles. Its website, Armtimes, continues the title online, and the newspaper is widely described as the Pashinyan family newspaper because his wife, Anna Hakobyan, serves as editor-in-chief.

The history of Haykakan Zhamanak cannot be separated from the biography of its founder. The newspaper was attacked, sued, fined and deprived of its editor by imprisonment, yet it survived to see its founder take power. That arc, from persecuted opposition sheet to a title perceived as close to the government its founder now leads, makes it a central case study in the relationship between journalism and politics in Armenia.

Origins in the Closure of Oragir

Haykakan Zhamanak was launched in 1999 as the successor to Oragir, a daily newspaper Pashinyan had established in 1998. Oragir published a series of articles alleging corruption in and around President Kocharyan's circle. Affected figures, including the then national security minister Serzh Sargsyan, sued for defamation. Pashinyan refused to retract or pay, was sentenced for contempt of court, and although the prison sentence was suspended by the Court of Appeals after international pressure, Oragir was shut down by the government. Pashinyan was the first journalist in independent Armenia to face criminal charges of that kind, a fact noted by Encyclopaedia Britannica in its account of the case.

Haykakan Zhamanak rose directly from that closure. It was published by Dareskizb LLC from 37 Israyelyan Street in Yerevan, in Armenian, with Russian-language material also associated with the title, and carried the ISSN 1829-2380. Where one opposition newspaper had been closed, another appeared under a new name with the same editor and the same editorial mission.

Nikol Pashinyan as Editor

Pashinyan, born on 1 June 1975 in Ijevan, had worked as a journalist since 1992 for a succession of newspapers with an opposition orientation. He was Haykakan Zhamanak's editor-in-chief in practice from 1999 until 2008 and remained its nominal editor until 2012. Under his editorship the paper became known for unsparing criticism of President Kocharyan, of defence minister and later president Serzh Sargsyan, and of wealthy government-connected business figures. Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty described it in 2004 as sympathetic to Armenia's former leadership under Levon Ter-Petrosyan and known for its hard-hitting coverage of Kocharyan and his government. Pashinyan was a supporter of Ter-Petrosyan, was critical of Armenia's close relations with Russia, and argued for closer relations with Turkey instead.

The work carried physical risk. On 23 December 1999 Pashinyan was beaten by a gang of about a dozen men reportedly led by a local businessman angered by an article in Haykakan Zhamanak accusing him of corruption. The attack set a pattern: the newspaper's journalism repeatedly produced consequences that went far beyond newsroom debate.

2008, Imprisonment and Anna Hakobyan's Editorship

Pashinyan was one of the leaders of the protests that followed the disputed presidential election of February 2008, in which Ter-Petrosyan lost to Serzh Sargsyan. The protests were dispersed on 1 March 2008 with the deaths of ten people. Convicted of organising mass disorders, Pashinyan went into hiding, surrendered in mid-2009, and was sentenced to seven years in prison. He was released in May 2011 under a general amnesty and was elected to parliament in 2012.

With Pashinyan underground and then imprisoned, editorial responsibility for Haykakan Zhamanak passed to his wife, Anna Hakobyan, who remains editor-in-chief. At that period the paper was affiliated with the small opposition Democratic Homeland Party led by former MP Petros Makeyan, which had split from Ter-Petrosyan's Pan-Armenian National Movement. Hakobyan's editorship meant the newspaper continued publishing through its founder's imprisonment rather than collapsing, as many personality-led Armenian titles have done when their editor was removed.

Defamation Cases and Financial Pressure

Like other Armenian opposition newspapers, Haykakan Zhamanak operated under constant legal pressure. Armenia decriminalised libel in May 2010, but the reform introduced high civil damages, and the number of civil defamation suits against newspapers rose sharply. In February 2011 a Yerevan court ordered Haykakan Zhamanak to pay three government-connected businessmen, Samvel Aleksanian, Ruben Hayrapetian and Levon Sargsian, a combined sum of about 16,500 US dollars for publishing allegations about their involvement in criminal activities, and to retract the allegations. Human Rights Watch noted that the average monthly salary in Armenia at the time was about 90 dollars, putting the scale of the award in perspective. The newspaper sought donations from its readers to pay the fine and keep publishing. The case is regularly cited in international reporting as an example of how civil defamation awards were used to threaten the survival of critical newspapers in Armenia.

Ownership and the Publisher Dareskizb

Haykakan Zhamanak is owned by Dareskizb LLC. The Media Ownership Monitor Armenia records that the company is widely perceived as owned by the family of Prime Minister Pashinyan. Seventy percent of Dareskizb is held by Kima Mkrtchyan, the mother of Anna Hakobyan. Hayk Gevorgyan holds twenty percent; he became a shareholder in 2002, has worked at the newspaper since its founding, and was elected to the National Assembly in 2018 on the My Step alliance list. Petros Makeyan holds the remaining ten percent; he is one of the founders of Dareskizb and a politician who previously served as deputy governor and as a member of parliament. The Monitor also notes that the outlet publishes an annual financial report on its website and that advertising is its sole source of revenue. This ownership structure explains why the description family newspaper, applied to the title by outside observers, is structural as well as journalistic.

From Print Daily to Online Outlet

The Media Ownership Monitor Armenia describes Armtimes as the online successor to the Haykakan Zhamanak newspaper: the print edition ceased publication and the outlet now operates exclusively online as a socio-political news website. Readers should therefore distinguish between the historic print daily, which shaped Armenian opposition politics between 1999 and the 2010s, and the current digital outlet at armtimes.com, which continues the name, the editorship and the ownership. The transition mirrors the wider Armenian market, in which print circulations shrank and even famous newspaper brands migrated to the web, but in this case it carries an additional political dimension: the migration was completed while the founder of the title governed the country.

Political Transformation After 2018

In spring 2018 Pashinyan led the protest movement that forced Serzh Sargsyan's resignation, and on 8 May 2018 he became Prime Minister. The newspaper he had founded as an instrument of opposition thus became associated with the head of government. That reversal is the defining fact of the title's recent history. A newspaper built on exposing the business and political dealings of those in power was now edited by the prime minister's wife and majority-owned within his extended family. Armenian media monitors and opposition critics have treated the outlet accordingly, as a pro-government voice, while its own history gives it a credibility and a readership that newer pro-government outlets do not possess. Any assessment of Haykakan Zhamanak and Armtimes today has to hold both halves of the story together: the genuine record of opposition journalism under pressure, and the present position of closeness to power.

Coverage and Readership

As a print daily, Haykakan Zhamanak concentrated on Armenian domestic politics: the presidency, parliament, corruption allegations, the security services, elections and the opposition movement. United States State Department reporting in the mid-2000s identified it as Armenia's highest-circulation daily, while noting that even it sold fewer than 6,000 copies a day, a figure that illustrates how small the Armenian print market is and how far newspaper influence exceeded raw sales through political citation, republication and word of mouth. Online, Armtimes publishes socio-political news for an Armenian-reading audience, continuing the domestic-politics focus of the print title in a faster digital format.

Place in Armenian Media History

Few newspapers anywhere have a founder who moved directly from an editor's desk, through prison, to the premiership. Haykakan Zhamanak is therefore documented far beyond Armenia's borders: in Britannica, in Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty reporting, in Human Rights Watch and Freedom House annual reports, and in the Media Ownership Monitor. Its record includes a predecessor closed by the government, an editor beaten in the street and later imprisoned, a landmark defamation fine paid with readers' donations, and a successful continuation under the editor's spouse. It is, simultaneously, a story of press resilience and a story about how completely journalism and political power can become intertwined in a small media market.

Assessment

Haykakan Zhamanak matters for two reasons. First, as a newspaper: between 1999 and the mid-2010s it was the most visible opposition daily in Armenia, and its treatment by the authorities became an international benchmark for the state of Armenian press freedom. Second, as a political document: its journey from Oragir's closure to the premiership of its founder traces the whole arc of post-2008 Armenian politics. The print daily no longer appears, and its successor Armtimes works in a different role from the one the name originally represented. Readers who understand that transformation understand a great deal about modern Armenia itself.