Friday, July 8, 2022
Power Plant Run By Pashinian’s Brother Since Dubious Selloff
• Karine Simonian
Armenia - A hydroelectric plant on the Marts river, July 8, 2022
A brother of Prime Minister Nikol Pashinian is the executive director of a small
hydroelectric power plant in northern Armenia whose former owners sold it for
just 50,000 drams ($120) last year, official records show.
The plant located on the mountainous Marts river was co-owned by Samvel
Darbinian, a former mayor of the nearby city of Vanadzor, and his brother.
Darbinian has faced a string of corruption charges since the 2018 “velvet
revolution” that brought Pashinian to power.
Last November, a Vanadzor court found him guilty of one of those charges but
dropped the case, citing a statute of limitations. The decision came six months
after the sale of the Marts power plant.
Its official buyer is a 20-year-old nephew of Khachatur Kokobelian, a
businessman leading a small pro-government party. The new owner named
Pashinian’s brother Armen to run the plant immediately after the deal.
Armen Pashinian used to live in Russia. He returned to Armenia after the 2018
regime change. The fact-checking website Fip.am revealed recently that he is
also the chief executive of three other businesses belonging to the Kokobelian
family.
Earlier this week, Darbinian dismissed suggestions that he sold the
hydroelectric facility to avoid imprisonment. Both the ex-mayor, who ran
Vanadzor from 1999-2016, and his brother Seyran refused to give a clear reason
for the sale.
“I sold it because I wanted to sell,” Seyran Darbinian said vaguely.
In a written response to RFE/RL’s Armenian Service sent on Friday, the Armenian
state registry of legal entities revealed that the new owner bought the plant
for as little as 50,000 drams.
The plant had an authorized capital of 250 million drams ($610,000) as of April
2021. According to Armenia’s national power distribution network, it produced
more than $200,000 worth of electricity annually in 2019 and 2020.
Nikol Pashinian has repeatedly claimed to have eliminated “systemic corruption”
in Armenia. Law-enforcement authorities have launched dozens of high-profile
corruption investigations during his rule, mostly targeting former top
government officials and individuals linked to them.
Critics say that Pashinian uses corruption inquiries to crack down on his
political opponents. They also claim that some members of his entourage are busy
enriching themselves or their cronies and question the integrity of procurements
administered by the current government.
Ex-Minister Reticent About Possible Seizure Of U.S. Villa
• Naira Bulghadarian
Armenia -- Finance Minister Gagik Khachatrian attends a parliament session in
Yerevan, November 16, 2015.
Gagik Khachatrian, a former Armenian finance minister and tax chief standing
trial on corruption charges, refused on Friday to comment on U.S.
law-enforcement authorities’ efforts to confiscate his luxury mansion in
California.
Khachatrian, who was arrested in August 2020 and freed on bail more than a year
later, is facing a string of accusations, including abuse of power, forgery and
bribery.
In particular, he stands accused of receiving more than $20 million to ensure
privileged treatment of companies owned by Gagik Tsarukian, one of Armenia’s
richest men. According to the National Security Service (NSS), the bribe was
paid in 2009 by Sedrak Arustamian, the top manager of those companies, in the
form of two bogus loans transferred to Khachatrian’s overseas bank accounts.
Both Arustamian and Khachatrian maintain that the massive cash transfer was a
commercial transaction.
Khachatrian and his family used the money to buy the 3,126 square-meter (33,652
square-foot) mansion in an exclusive Los Angeles area in 2011. The U.S.
Department of Justice moved to seize the property in early May weeks after it
was put up for sale with an asking price of $63.5 million. In a forfeiture
complaint filed in a California district court, the department alleged that the
“mega-mansion” was purchased with bribes paid by Arustamian.
“Gagik Khachatrian and his sons are charged in Armenia with receiving bribes in
violation of the criminal code of the Republic of Armenia,” it noted in a May 5
statement.
Armenia - Former Finance Minister Gagik Khachatrian and one of his nephews go on
trial, August 26, 2020.
Khachatrian’s legal team rejected the allegations and pledged to fight against
the asset seizure in the U.S. court. One of the defense lawyers, Yerem Sargsian,
insisted on Friday that the U.S. authorities lack “factual evidence” in support
of the allegations.
“Everything was done very transparently,” he said, referring to the purchase of
the Los Angeles mansion.
According to a spokesman for Armenia’s Office of the Prosecutor-General, U.S.
law-enforcement officials have assured their Armenian colleagues that proceeds
from the sale of the property will be given to Yerevan if they succeed in
confiscating it.
Khachatrian himself was reluctant to comment on the proceedings launched by the
U.S. Department of Justice. “Only my lawyers can comment on these issues,” he
told RFE/RL’s Armenian Service during the latest session of his ongoing trial in
Yerevan.
Khachatrian’s two sons and one of his nephews went into hiding in 2020 after
being also indicted in the high-profile case. Their whereabouts remain unknown.
Khachatrian, 66, headed Armenia’s State Revenue Committee (SRC) from 2008-2014
and served as finance minister from 2014-2016. He was dogged by corruption
allegations throughout his tenure, with some media outlets and opposition
figures accusing him of using his position to enrich himself and his extended
family.
They pointed to the family’s extensive business interests, which include a major
telecommunication company, a shopping mall and a car dealership in Yerevan.
Khachatrian repeatedly denied setting up or supporting these businesses, saying
that they belong to his sons and other relatives.
Yerevan Deplores Estonian Speaker’s Trip To Azeri-Held Karabakh Town
BELGIUM -- Estonian Prime Minister Juri Ratas speaks to the press as he arrives
on the first day of a summit of European Union (EU) leaders at the EU
headquarters in Brussels, March 22, 2018
Parliament speaker Alen Simonian on Friday criticized his Estonian counterpart
Juri Ratas for visiting the Nagorno-Karabakh town of Shushi (Shusha) captured by
the Azerbaijani army during the 2020 war.
Ratas and members of an Estonian parliamentary delegation headed by him
travelled to Shushi on May 24 during an official visit to Azerbaijan.
Simonian described the trip and pro-Azerbaijani comments made there by Ratas as
“extremely concerning” during a meeting with Estonia’s Tbilisi-based ambassador
to Armenia, Riina Kaljurand. He said they run counter to Armenia’s “friendly”
relations with Estonia and the Baltic state’s stated support for a Karabakh
settlement sought by the OSCE Minsk Group.
“The president of the National Assembly of Armenia expressed hope that his
Estonian counterpart will visit Armenia soon, familiarize himself with the
situation on the ground and also meet with officials representing
Nagorno-Karabakh,” read a statement released by the Armenian parliament’s press
office.
Armenia - Parliament speaker Alen Simonian meets Estonian Ambassador Riina
Kaljurand, July 8, 2022
Earlier this year, the Armenian Foreign Ministry sent a note of protest to the
United Nations after a senior UN official participated in an event organized by
the Azerbaijani government in Shushi. Reacting to the event, Karabakh’s ethnic
Armenian leadership accused Baku of trying to use international bodies for
“legitimizing the results of its aggression” against Karabakh.
Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev praised Ratas’s visit to the Azerbaijani-held
town when he received the latter in Baku on May 25. Aliyev said the Estonian
speaker had a chance to see evidence of “large-scale destruction committed by
the Armenians” there.
NAGORNO-KARABAKH -- A view shows Ghazanchetsots Cathedral in Shushi (Shusha)
damaged by recent shelling, October 8, 2020.
Baku itself has been accused of trying to wipe out Shushi’s Armenian heritage.
It emerged last year that the town’s Holy Savior Cathedral has been stripped of
its conical dome and cross attached to it.
Yerevan said this was done for “depriving the Shushi Cathedral of its Armenian
identity.” The Azerbaijani authorities claimed that they are simply renovating
the 19th century church damaged during the war.
The imposing cathedral, also known as Ghazanchetsots, was twice struck by
long-range Azerbaijani missiles during the 2020 war.
The authorities in Stepanakert have also accused Azerbaijan of systematically
destroying another, smaller Armenian church located in Shushi. They say that
Baku plans to transform it into a Russian Orthodox church under the guise of
major renovation.
Reprinted on ANN/Armenian News with permission from RFE/RL
Copyright (c) 2022 Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty, Inc.
1201 Connecticut Ave., N.W. Washington DC 20036.