Later, Safaryan decided to compete for Armenia, where he began to train under the head coach of the Armenian freestyle wrestling team Araik Baghdadyan.

His first success at the senior international level came when he won a bronze medal at the 2012 European Wrestling Championships.

Shortly thereafter, he competed at the 2012 Summer Olympics in London, but was unable to win a medal due to controversial refereeing while facing Kazakh Akzhurek Tanatarov in the quarterfinals, amid a number of other controversial Kazakhstan victories.

Later that year Safaryan also won the gold medal at the 2013 World Wrestling Championships in Budapest, taking revenge on Tanatarov in the quarterfinals and defeating Cuban Liván López, another 2012 Olympic medalist, in the finals.

[4] Safaryan was named the Armenian Athlete of the Year for 2013 by vote conducted by the Republican Federation of Sports Journalists of Armenia.