After the recent murders of Armenians in Russia, senator of Kalmikia, member of the Russian Federation Council, head of the Russian-Armenian Business Cooperation Association (RABCA) Levon Chakhmakhchyan, who is originally from Armenia, was accused of corruption and arrested. According to the Russian press, the latter was arrested with the chief accountant of the RABCA on June 2 in the reception room of the director of Transaero company for taking a bribe worth $300.000. Chakhmakhchyan’s son-in-law, who was an officer at the Russian Clearance Chamber (CC), was also arrested.
According to the Russian press, Chakhmakhchyan had been invited to meet head of the Transaero company, Alexander Pleshakov. The problem is that one of the CC officers, Vladimir Panskov had checked the accounts and overall review of the Transaero air company and found out that the latter had a debt to the government worth $300 million for aircraft import. Pleshakov knew what contacts Chakhmakhchyan had and his power and thus asked him “to do something”. He gave a case filled with money that had been marked for Arushanov, and when they left the room, they were arrested near the doors.
Just after this incident, head of the Russian Federation Council, Sergey Mironov sent a letter to the president of Kalmikia demanding to take Chakhmakhchyan’s obligations away and take away his deputy untouchable right away too. According to Mironov, this problem will be solved in a matter of days. As for the president of Kalmikia, he announced that he agreed with Mironov. He also said that Chakhmakhchyan had done a lot for their country. For example, the senator formed a group of doctors from Moscow and Saint Petersburg and took them to Kalmikia to do operations there. He was also actively involved in legislative work in the Kalmikia parliament. In any case, the president of Kalmikia said that only the police had a right to make assumptions concerning this recent arrest.
We could expect such an answer from Ilyumjinov. In 2002, Chakhmakhchyan supported him to be elected as president, although the Kremlin was against it. And now, when the senator doesn’t have too much power, the only thing he can do is to obey the decisions of Putin, Mironov and others. Ilyumjinov is just a “tool” and does not play a serious role in this process.
As for the general prosecutor’s office of Russia, they are going to bring a case against Chakhmakhchyan based on Article 159 of the Russian criminal code (organizing group fraud). The general prosecutor’s office has applied to the Supreme Court and presented facts proving that there is crime. As a matter of fact, this incident coincided with the replacement of the Russian general prosecutor, Vladimir Ustinov. Russians think that this is a paradox because recently, Ustinov was working very well and did everything Putin told him to do, as well as fought against corruption.
Who organized this action against Chakhmakhchyan? Chakhmakhchyan is sure that this is a provocation organized by the head of the Transaero company, Pleshakov. As for head of the Russian CC, he says that he checked up on the activities of the CC on June 3 and found many violations. Later Stepashin gave the results of what he had found to the Russian federal security services and police, who took action at once. On June 6, Stepashin announced that he had lost his trust in his colleague Panskov, who accused the Transaero of hiding their $300,000,000 debt to the government. The CC head announced that three officers working with Panskov had been fired as well. In spite of this, the relatives of Panskov told the Russian “Comersant” newspaper that Panskov was not guilty, but was going to resign. What’s more, the auditor says that he can prove with documents that the Transaero company has huge debts to pay to the government. As for the airline company, they told the same newspaper the following, “we have won several court proceedings and we are clean like a newborn child”.
As for the CC, on June 6 they appended information in their web page writing that, based on their report, no violations were found in the accounts of the Transaero company.
In any case, the policy of the Russian police is very amazing. Since Chakhmakhchyan was arrested, the Russian press writes about discovering a corruption case. In spite of this, some questions remain unanswered. Why don’t the police say anything concerning the Transaero while the auditor assures that he has documents proving that the airline company has made numerous violations? Why did the Russian federal police service decide that Pleshakov must be the one giving bribe to Chakhmakhchyan? Finally, we shouldn’t forget one thing that is very important: after being arrested Chakhmakhchyan said that the police officers used swear words and offended him by making fun of his nationality. Is this a coincidence? Are the police officers that stupid to use swear words without having permission for that, especially since Armenians are facing more problems tied with ethnicity in Russia?
The fact that Chakhmakhchyan was their target is not a coincidence either, because he is head of the business cooperation organization of the two countries and he backed Kocharyan during the 2003 presidential elections. Putin doesn’t just take steps without thinking about them first.
As for the Russian press, now they say that they haven’t been able to contact Chakhmakhchyan for two days. The senator also doesn’t visit the business cooperation office or RABCA. Currently the Federation Council, CC and Russian general prosecutor’s office are doing their best to imprison Chakhmakhchyan, and the Russian press writes that it will probably happen in several days. There are some newspapers that write that Chakhmakhchyan will frame his son-in-law, who will be jailed, while Chakhmakhchyan will be released. We still don’t know anything about the Russian president’s decision.