Facing a storm of criticism, Armenia’s Public Television apologized on Monday for broadcasting a pop concert on the sixth anniversary of the outbreak of the last war in Nagorno-Karabakh that left at least 3,833 Armenian soldiers and civilians dead. The state-run broadcaster aired pop singer Tata Simo- nian’s two-hour-long perfor- mance on Sunday as many people across Armenia laid flowers at the graves of the fallen soldiers. Prime Minis- ter Nikol Pashinian, his po- litical allies and members of his government again did not issue statements or visit the Yerablur military cemetery in Yerevan on the occasion. The airing of the concert sparked an uproar on social media from opposition pol- iticians, public figures and ordinary citizens. They ac- cused the Public Television of disrespecting the memory of the war dead. “I do not know of any other state or ‘elite’ in the world that would treat the memory of the thousands of young guys, who sacrificed their lives for it, in this way,” wrote Karen Harutiunian, the editor of the Civilnet.am news service. “Shame — a thousand shames — on you.” Some government crit- ics claimed that the concert was aired for the purpose of distracting the public from Pashinian’s mishandling of the disastrous six-week war and preventing a backlash against his current appease- ment policy towards Azer- baijan. Simonian, who has reg- ularly performed at govern- ment-sponsored concerts in recent years, added his voice to the criticism. In a late-night Facebook post, the veteran pop star called the timing of his pre-record- ed appearance on the Public Television an “unjustifiable gross error” and denied any responsibility for it. The state TV’s main First Channel aired the con- cert again early on Monday, shortly after Simonian’s negative reaction. The flow of people to Yerablur contin- ued in the meantime. “Broadcasting an enter- tainment concert on the Pub- lic Television on September 27 was wrong mistake, and we accept full responsibility for it,” the broadcaster said in a statement about ten hours later. “We apologize for what happened,” added the broad- caster. “Relevant work pro- cedures are being reviewed to prevent such incidents from happening again.” “Public pressure is the reason why they are apol- ogizing,” countered Meru- zhan Ter-Gulanian, a writer and media personality who used to sit on the Public Television’s supervisory board. He called for the res- ignation of Pashinian’s loy- alists running the country’s leading TV channel.