Armenia Battles Russian Disinformation Amid Diplomatic Shift and Elections

As tensions rise ahead of Armenia’s June parliamentary elections, officials have raised alarms about an escalating campaign of foreign disinformation and hybrid attacks targeting the country’s democratic processes and international relations.

Intelligence services reported last month that “malign information operations by external actors” are actively attempting to influence voters through false information and conspiracy theories. While Armenian authorities stopped short of directly naming the source, experts point to Russia as the primary culprit.

“Russia is dissatisfied with Armenia,” said independent analyst Benjamin Matevosyan. He explained that Moscow views Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan’s Western pivot as an “anti-Russian project that would be used against Russia.”

The timing of these operations coincides with Armenia’s significant foreign policy shift. Once firmly in Russia’s sphere of influence, Yerevan has frozen its participation in the Moscow-led Collective Security Treaty Organisation while strengthening ties with the European Union and United States. This realignment comes after Armenia’s bitter perception that Russia failed to provide military support during its recent conflicts with Azerbaijan over the disputed Karabakh region.

The disinformation campaigns appear designed not only to influence the upcoming elections but also to derail Armenia’s peace process with Azerbaijan. Last year, the two countries initialed a peace agreement under U.S. mediation following decades of hostility and two wars over Karabakh.

Gegham Vardanyan of the Media Initiatives Center noted that “hybrid information warfare has intensified alongside Armenia’s changing relations with Russia.” Despite the political reorientation, Russia maintains considerable cultural and economic influence in Armenia, with Russian state television channels and media outlets like Sputnik remaining widely accessible.

The tactics employed are sophisticated and varied. Vardanyan highlighted evidence of activity by “Russian-linked hacker groups,” including Fancy Bear (also known as APT28), which has previously targeted Armenian military personnel and diplomats. The campaigns frequently utilize “clone sites” that mimic legitimate Western news outlets to spread fabricated stories.

In one instance, a fake French-language website falsely claimed that Paris was shipping nuclear waste to Armenia. Another site, designed to resemble a legitimate French outlet, spread false reports about Prime Minister Pashinyan purchasing a luxury mansion in France. Russian and Azerbaijani outlets have also promoted narratives suggesting that EU monitoring mission officials in Armenia are spies.

“Social media narratives adopt a single core message: cooperation with the West is dangerous for Armenia,” Vardanyan explained.

Foreign Minister Ararat Mirzoyan has responded forcefully to these developments, stating that “the enemies of freedom do not sleep” and warning that such interference is likely to intensify as elections approach. He acknowledged the challenge of balancing press freedom with the need to counter malicious actors.

While Russia appears to be the primary source of disinformation, experts note that neighboring Azerbaijan and its ally Turkey are also involved in information operations targeting Armenia. The European Union has allocated 15 million euros (approximately $17.7 million) to help counter disinformation, though media security expert Samvel Martirosyan warned that even this assistance could be weaponized by hostile actors.

“Armenia has effectively found itself in a swamp of hybrid warfare, and the situation is made worse by internal actors who become links in this chain,” Martirosyan cautioned.

With Prime Minister Pashinyan’s party expected to perform well in the June elections against a fractured opposition, the stakes of this information battle extend beyond domestic politics to Armenia’s future geopolitical orientation and regional stability in the South Caucasus.