[1] He was an early member and leader of the National United Party (NUP), which sought Armenia's independence from the Soviet Union.

Since Armenia gained its independence in 1991, Hayrikyan has been active in Armenian politics as the leader of the Union for National Self-Determination, the successor party to the NUP, and took part in presidential elections in 1991 and 2013, surviving an assassination attempt during the latter.

In 1966 Hayrikyan was admitted to Yerevan Polytechnic Institute, where he attended night classes while working as an electrician in a factory in Nubarashen.

In 1977, he began a hunger strike in prison, demanding the release of all NUP members, the legalization of the party, and an independence referendum for Armenia, which was following by new criminal charges against him.

[3][4] During this period, Paruyr Hayrikyan acquired wide popularity, and was elected Chairman of the International Coordinating Center of the National Democratic Movement of the USSR, also known as Democracy and Independence.

In 1990, following pressure from a group of United States senators led by Bob Dole, Mikhail Gorbachev restored Hayrikyan's citizenship and allowed him to return.

[1] Since 1992, as an appointed Commandant of Goris, Hayrikyan took measures to ensure the efficient defense and organizing settlements of refugees in the Syunik and Artsakh.

He took part in the June–July 2015 anti-government protests, but his appearance among the demonstrators in Yerevan with a European Union flag was met with whistles and criticism.

In this book Hayrikyan presents "his experiences as a freedom fighter through a letter to the love of his youth whom he lost during his eighteen years in prison and exile".

According to Jewish writer Mikhail Heifetz, not only Armenians, but also many other Soviet dissidents were among the members and supporters of NUP (Viacheslav Chornovil, Vasyl Stus, Eduard Kuznetsov, and others).

[citation needed] Hayrikyan speaks Armenian, Russian, English and Latvian, and has a good command of French, Ukrainian and Lithuanian.