Former Armenian Minister of Education Armen Ashotyan, arrested last month on charges of abusing his official position and money laundering, will remain in detention.

Armenia's Corruption Appeals Court rejected a request, filed byAshotyan’s lawyers, that he be released from detention.

Ashotyan was education minister from 2009 to 2016 and served as deputy chairman of the Republican Party of Armenia.

Armenia’s Investigative Committee (IC) says Ashotyan organized the embezzlement of AMD 185,606,000 collected from membership fees of Yerevan’s State Medical University’s trade union. The IC also charged Ashotyan with a shady real estate transaction while board of trustee’s chairman of the medical university.

Ashotyan, a fierce critic of the Pashinyan government, described the charges as “a fabrication and political persecution”.