Yerevan Mayor Hrachya Sargsyan, citing his mission has been completed, resigned today.

Sargsyan was elected mayor in December 2021 after the Yerevan Municipal Council ousted Hayk Marutyan in a no-confidence vote.

The council’s ruling My Step (Im Kayl) faction, allied to PM Nikol Pashinyan, accused Marutyan of failing to implement the party’s campaign obligations, most notably that of eliminating systemic corruption.

Sargsyan, in a Facebook post, writes he has ensured the implementation of the faction’s campaign obligations and has resolved the political rift between the Yerevan Municipality and the national government.

Former Armenian Deputy PM Tigran Avinyan, now serving as one of the Armenian capital’s deputy mayors, will head the Civil Contract’s ballot in the upcoming municipal council election that will decide who will become Yerevan’s next mayor.

(The My Step Alliance, comprised of the Civil Contract Party, the Mission Party and various civil society representatives, was formed in August 2018 and was led by Armenian PM Nikol Pashinyan. The alliance dissolved in May 2021, following an announcement that Civil Contract would participate in the 2021 Armenian parliamentary elections independently.)