The Armenian Presidency Office reported that President Armen Sarkissian refused to dismiss the Armed Forces Chief of Staff Onik Gasparyan.
On the other hand, Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan said that the president's refusal to dismiss the chief of staff is in the interest of settling the internal situation, indicating that he would redirect the dismissal request in accordance with the constitution.
Pashinyan dismissed the Chief of the General Staff, Onik Gasparyan, last Thursday, after accusing him of being involved in a coup attempt to isolate him, but the president must sign this step.
Today, opposition supporters gathered in front of the presidential palace and parliament building in the capital Yerevan, demanding the dismissal of Pashinyan.
Parliament had failed to hold its sessions due to the lack of a constitutional quorum and the absence of the ruling party deputies.
The army, backed by the opposition, is demanding that Pashinyan and his government resign after his critics described his handling of the bloody conflict, which lasted for six weeks between Azerbaijan and Armenia in the Nagorno-Karabakh region late last year, as disastrous.
Karabakh war
Pashinyan has been facing protests and calls to resign since last November, after his opponents spoke of a "catastrophic" management of the 6-week bloody conflict between Azerbaijan and the forces of Armenian descent in the Nagorno-Karabakh region and surrounding areas.
Armenian forces lost large areas to Azerbaijani forces in last year's conflict that killed thousands.
A Russian peacekeeping force is currently deployed in the enclave, which is recognized by the international community as part of Azerbaijan, but its residents are of Armenian descent.
Since its independence with the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991, Armenia has witnessed a series of crises and political revolutions, some of them dead.