David Tonoyan

Tonoyan with Seyran Ohanyan.

He was born on December 27, 1967, in the city of Ust-Kamenogorsk (Now Oskemen), in the East Kazakhstan Region of the Kazakh SSR, or modern day Kazakhstan. In 1986, he joined the Soviet Armed Forces's Transcaucasian Military District. In 1991, he moved to Yerevan to attend Yerevan State University. Between 1998 and 2007, Tonoyan held various positions at NATO’s headquarters in Brussels, serving as the Armenian Representative to NATO for three years. In 2007, Tonoyan returned to Armenia to head the departments on international military cooperation and defense policy in the Ministry of Defense.

Tonoyan with Anatoly Antonov in 2012.

From 2010 to 2017, Tonoyan served a First Deputy Minister of Defense of Armenia, serving under Seyran Ohanyan and Vigen Sargsyan. According to a presidential decree signed on February 6, David Tonoyan was appointed to the position of Minister of Emergency Situations.[2] Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan appointed Tonoyan as Defense Minister on May 11, 2018, after Pashinyan took office three days earlier. He was recommended to the post by MP Ararat Mirzoyan, who said that Tonoyan was "absolutely qualified to be Armenian Defense Minister".[3] He is married with two children.[4][5]

As Minister of defense, Tonoyan saw to continue the reforms started by Vigen Sargsyan, which included numerous programs that are to strengthen Military-Society ties, increase the numbers of the professional NCO corps, expand the local military-industrial complex, among other things. One his primary tasks is to reduce the number of corruption cases and to eliminate the Dedovshchina culture among conscripts that was an heritage from Soviet times.

• 1991 - Yerevan State University
• 1997 - Military University of the Ministry of Defense of the Russian Federation

• Order "For Services to Fatherland
• Medal For Meritorious Service
• Vazgen Sargsyan Medal
• Andranik Ozanyan Medal