VIDEO: State Suffers More Than 116 Million Dram Loss as Police Unveils New Findings

The Criminal Police Department's Anti-Corruption and Economic Crime Unit has gathered factual data indicating that the management of a company registered in Armenia, engaged in the acquisition, import, processing, and export of natural mineral resources, has submitted obviously false data in tax-relevant reports and has evaded the payment of particularly large taxes.

Specifically, during the period from December 2017 to March 2019, the mentioned company had contracts for the supply of goods equivalent to 273 million 700 thousand drams to a buyer company registered in the Russian Federation for 39 million 290 thousand rubles. However, the company registered in Armenia exported and sold only goods valued at 126 million 246 thousand drams to Russia. During the period from September 2018 to August 2019, the management of the Russian company transferred to the Armenian company’s bank accounts an amount equivalent to 572 million 46 thousand drams, which is 1 million 25 thousand euros and 21 million 621 thousand drams equivalent to 45 thousand dollars.

It was also revealed that in November 2018, an amount of 21 million 892 thousand drams was transferred from the Armenian company’s account to the production director of the company, who used it for personal purposes. Additionally, 20 employees of the company received monthly rental payments outside their officially registered salaries during the period from 2018 to 2021 without any accounting records.

As a result of these illegal activities, the Armenian-registered company caused the state a loss of around 116 million 286 thousand drams. Furthermore, factual data was obtained showing that the management of the same company, with the intention of converting particularly large properties obtained through criminal means—specifically tax evasion of considerable amounts—has created and facilitated fake payment documents with substantial obligations, transferring large sums to an offshore company’s account over different periods, thus managing to conceal the criminal origin of approximately 116 million 286 thousand drams obtained from illegal activities.

A criminal case has been initiated in the Anti-Corruption and Economic Crime Unit, which has been forwarded to the Prosecutor General's Office of Armenia.