Prime Minister and Assassination
Despite ensuring that President Ter-Petrosyan's side won the disputed 1995 election, and crushing street protests against the manipulated results, Sargsyan abandoned him in late 1997 and switched his support to prime minister Robert Kocharyan, who soon took over as president.
After serving as defense minister, he was appointed prime minister on June 11 by President Kocharyan. Sargsyan was killed, however, along with parliament speaker and former communist leader Karen Demirchyan and several other politicians when gunmen, headed by journalist Nairi Hunanyan, took over the parliament building.
The other parliament members were held as hostages until the next day. A week later, Vazgen's brother, Aram Sargsyan became prime minister until May 2000. He was buried at Yerablur military cemetery.
Read more about this topic: Vazgen Sargsyan
Famous quotes containing the words prime and/or minister:
“The prime lesson the social sciences can learn from the natural sciences is just this: that it is necessary to press on to find the positive conditions under which desired events take place, and that these can be just as scientifically investigated as can instances of negative correlation. This problem is beyond relativity.”
—Ruth Benedict (18871948)
“[T]he minister preached a sermon on Jonah and the whale, at the end of which an old chief arose and declared, We have heard several of the white people talk and lie; we know they will lie, but this is the biggest lie we ever heard.”
—Administration in the State of Miss, U.S. public relief program (1935-1943)