ORSIS: Russian Arms Manufacturing Company Has Not Sued Armenia's Ministry of Defense

Scandalous news regarding the failure of the tender appeared in the media as early as last July. The company expresses confusion over the circulated information and hopes that the Armenian Investigative Committee will do everything possible to clarify the situation.

The Promtechnologiya company (the ORSIS arms brand) has not sued Armenia's Ministry of Defense, according to a statement on the company’s official website.

Earlier, media reports citing a representative of the company indicated that after the failure of the weapons supply tender, in which only the Russian ORSIS company participated, a criminal case had been initiated.

In May 2019, the Armenian Ministry of Defense announced a competition for the supply of arms and ammunition worth several million dollars. The Russian ORSIS company submitted a bid, but the tender was soon closed for reasons unknown to the company. Subsequently, the Russian company appealed to the appeals commission and its lawyer in Armenia, which resulted in the initiation of a criminal case under the article of the Armenian Criminal Code regarding “Negligent Attitude Toward Service.”

According to the company’s representative, they have already appealed to the military attaché of the Armenian embassy in Russia to clarify the situation regarding the tender. He also noted that ORSIS, as part of Promtechnologiya, has been operating in the ammunition market for the past 8 years.

It has supplied bullets and military optics to Armenia for several years, but now the company is on the blacklist of the Armenian Armed Forces. In connection with this, on September 17, the company’s press service, denying reports of a judicial review with the Armenian Ministry of Defense, stated: “In connection with the information spread in the media about the unjustified exclusion of Promtechnologiya LLC from the Armenian Ministry of Defense tender and the inclusion of the company in the suppliers’ blacklist, we report that an investigation is currently underway within the framework of a criminal case regarding these facts.”

The company expresses hope that the Armenian Investigative Committee will do everything possible to clarify the circumstances and that all guilty parties will be held accountable, regardless of their position or rank. “The company hopes that partner and effective relations will be restored,” the statement said.

It should be noted that Gevorg Altunyan, head of the public relations department of the Armenian Ministry of Defense, told Sputnik Armenia that an investigation is currently underway, and they cannot comment on the case. The company had previously stated that the current situation threatens to disrupt the project to build a bullet factory in Armenia, which was supposed to be established based on Russian investments, involving several million US dollars.