Taron Chakhoyan, the deputy chief of the Armenian prime minister's staff, must be subjected to disciplinary liability, Armenia’s former Deputy Minister of Justice, human rights activist Ruben Melikyan said late on Tuesday.

His comments came after Chakhoyan shared on Facebook a photo of a street full of rubbish, writing, “This is a symbolic photo. Baghramyan Avenue today.” However, it has turned out that the photo actually shows a street in a Ukrainian city after a holiday in September 2017.

Armenia’s opposition on Tuesday decided to unblock the avenue in downtown Yerevan that it had been blocking since late February.

“Taron Chakhoyan used to be just a trader of the falsifications and lies of [PM] Nikol [Pashinyan]. Today he is already a senior official – a deputy chief of staff of the government.

“Thus, the spread of a fake photo by this man with a clear implication of discrediting the opposition is not just a mean act (not punishable by law), but a clear disciplinary violation for which he must be subjected to disciplinary liability,” Melikyan wrote on Facebook, adding the official later removed the photo and apologized for it.