13 Facts About Vagharshak Harutiunyan

Vagharshak Varnazi Harutiunyan is an Armenian military figure and politician currently serving as Armenia's ambassador to Russia.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan previously served as the Defence Minister of Armenia from 1999 to 2000 and again from 2020 to 2021.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan graduated from the Caspian Higher Naval School in 1978.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan than graduated from the Grechko Naval Academy and the Military Academy of the General Staff of the Armed Forces of the Soviet Union in 1991.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan switched allegiance to Armenia prior to the fall of the Soviet Union.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan was named Deputy Minister of Internal Affairs and Deputy Chairman of the Defence Committee of Armenia in 1991, in the middle of the First Nagorno-Karabakh War.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan was chosen as the representative of the Armenian Armed Forces at the CIS in 1994.

In 1999, Vagharshak Harutiunyan returned to Armenia to replace Vazgen Sargsyan as Defence Minister of Armenia on 11 June 1999 after Sargsyan was elected Prime Minister.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan joined Sargsyan and Head of the Government Staff Shahen Karamanukyan in the meeting of the Commonwealth of Independent States heads of government in Yalta, Ukraine on 7 October 1999.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan left the post of defence minister on 20 May 2000.

On 22 July 2002, Vagharshak Harutiunyan was stripped of his military rank of lieutenant general by order of President of Armenia Robert Kocharyan.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan was appointed as defence minister by Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and President Armen Sarksyan on 20 November 2020, following the resignation of David Tonoyan.

Vagharshak Harutiunyan's appointment were among a number of changes in the Second Pashinyan government following the Nagorno-Karabakh ceasefire agreement that ended the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War.