Thousands of people protested Friday in Armenia’s capital, Yerevan, against the government’s decision to cede four territories to Azerbaijan.

Armenia agreed to return four villages to Azerbaijan last month in a move that upset some inhabitants, especially in the Tavush region. The decision came as a result of Armenia’s push for peace after Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan stated that Armenia decided to adjust the border between the two countries and cede the four territories to Azerbaijan to avoid war. The protests have grown since then, and protestors are now demanding that Pashinyan resign.

Bagrat Galstanyan, a cleric of the Armenian Apostolic Church, has become an important and leading figure in these protests. Considering the territorial decision as unilateral and unconstitutional, Galstanyan gave the prime minister an hour to resign, which was then extended by fifteen minutes. After no response, the archbishop called on the Armenian parliament to take measures to remove Pashinyan from office and vowed acts of peaceful civil disobedience if that was not to take place.

The Christian Emergency Alliance compared the situation to when Armenian Christians were “cleansed from their ancient lands in Nagorno-Karabakh by Azerbaijan.”

Nevertheless, the Armenia Ministry of Foreign Affairs is moving forward with the negotiations with Azerbaijan. In a statement released Saturday, the ministry said both countries’ foreign ministers “welcomed the progress on delimitation” and that the parties agreed to continue negotiating open issues in which differences remain.