Corruption Prevention Commission Decides to Impose Administrative Penalty on Zaroui Batoyan

In 2020, the Corruption Prevention Commission (the Commission) decided to impose an administrative penalty on Zaroui Batoyan, enforcing a fine of 200,000 Armenian drams for the declarant's inadvertent submission of incorrect or incomplete information in the declaration.

Zaroui Batoyan, Armenia's Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, who was the Deputy Minister in the same ministry in 2018, failed to declare her income in the section "Income of the Declarant Public Officer in the Tax Year" of the 2018 annual declaration submitted on June 21, 2019, regarding property, income, and related parties.

In response to the Commission's request for explanations, Zaroui Batoyan informed that the submission of the declaration, which violated the requirements for its completion, was due to the fact that, unlike other fields, the income section was not specified as mandatory for completion, and the system allowed for omitting them. On this basis, Zaroui Batoyan requested to consider her failure to declare income as a purely technical omission and allowed her to correct the 2018 annual declaration by stating 7,515,233 Armenian drams in the section "Income of the Declarant Public Officer in the Tax Year."

However, the Commission reaffirmed that all fields subject to declaration are mandatory to complete without exception. After paying the fine, Zaroui Batoyan will be granted seven working days to make the necessary corrections in the section "Income of the Declarant Public Officer in the Tax Year" of the 2018 annual declaration regarding property, income, and related parties.