On the evening of 23 April, Armenia celebrated the resignation of Serzh Sargsyan, the man who had ruled Armenia for ten years as president — and for a week as prime minister. Strangers hugged and congratulated one another, cars honked their horns, and shops ran out of champagne. Everybody celebrated in their own way: some put tables in the streets and marked the occasion traditionally, with vodka and a barbecue, while others danced to Berlin-style techno music in bars.
Still, the happiness seemed universal.nnToday, on 25 April, the protesters are back on the streets. As one of the protesters said to Radio Liberty correspondent on the station’s live feed: “We have overthrown the tsar, now we need to overthrow tsarism.” Formally, the protests have a new target — acting prime-minister Karen Karapetyan, who represents the (still) ruling Republican Party, which at least at the time of writing, possessed the majority in Armenia’s parliament.
