Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan reiterated on Thursday that the country’s proposed new constitution should not contain a reference to Armenia’s Declaration of Independence of Armenia, arguing that the document is built around a “logic of conflict.”
Speaking at a press briefing, Pashinyan said he sees no reason to change his earlier position on the issue.
“I have already addressed this issue, and I do not see any need to change my position. Yes, the new Constitution should not reference the Declaration of Independence. And I will explain why: the Declaration of Independence is structured around a logic of conflict. We cannot proceed with the logic of conflict and expect to build an independent state,” Pashinyan said.
The Armenian government first announced plans to draft a new constitution in 2019 as part of a broader reform agenda. In 2022, Pashinyan established a Constitutional Reform Council tasked with proposing amendments to the current constitution.
However, in May 2024, he expanded the council’s mandate, instructing it to draft an entirely new constitution from scratch before January 2027. Justice Minister Srbuhi Galyan, who heads the Constitutional Reform Council reaffirmed in February her pledge that the draft would be prepared before the end of March.
For a long time, Armenian authorities have sought to convince the public that the constitutional reform process is driven solely by domestic considerations and not by external pressure. In June 2025, Galyan rejected suggestions that the initiative was linked to outside demands, including those coming from Azerbaijan.
“Linking the planned constitutional changes to any external factor is wrong,” Galyan said at a press briefing at the time. “This is our internal issue. The people will decide whether or not they want a new constitution.”
Nevertheless, Azerbaijan has repeatedly made changes to Armenia’s constitution one of the key preconditions for signing a peace treaty with Yerevan.
A draft Armenian-Azerbaijani peace agreement was initialed in Washington, D.C. in August, but Ilham Aliyev’s government has continued to insist on constitutional changes before a final deal is signed.
Baku specifically demands that Armenia remove a constitutional preamble referencing the 1990 declaration of independence. That declaration, in turn, cites a 1989 unification act adopted by the legislative bodies of Soviet Armenia and the Nagorno-Karabakh Autonomous Oblast.
