There have been no improvements in the alleged case against Civilitas foundation established by former foreign minister Vartan Oskanyan, which was allegedly announced to be connected with money laundering.
Whatever the status of the case is, there is no information about it so far. Neither are they inviting Oskanyan to their office for questioning. The case was launched and announced on May 25 against Vartan Oskanyan’s Civilitas foundation for alleged money laundering. The NSS claims that the foundation has failed to pay taxes. 1,135mln dollars have been transferred to the accounts opened in the names of Vartan Oskanyan and the foundation’s board member Tigran Karapetyan, which the NSS claims is “disputable money”.
Vartan Oskanyan, the foundation’s director Salbi Ghazaryan and two other representatives of the organization are involved in the case as witnesses. Vartan Oskanyan and Salbi Ghazaryan have been invited to the foundation for several times but they refused to give testimony. Last time Oskanyan was invited to the NSS was on June 25, and there has been no information about the foundation published by the security services since then. The only news is that two months ago the state incomes committee started to check-up the files of the foundation. It seems the case is in a deadlock. It is two weeks that the representatives of the foundations are not invited to give testimony and generally there is no information about whether the NSS has any proofs of money laundering against the foundation. We contacted the NSS spokesperson Artsvin Baghramyan for information, but he refused to comment as he said the case was confidential.
The tax inspection committee does not say anything about the case and whether they have found any facts concerning the mentioned amount or no. The tax inspection body is checking up the files and activities of Paradygma Armenia company, which is the foundation’s contractor for accounting. S. Ghazaryan says she does not know what the tax inspection service is doing there and whether they have found anything. She says that she does not know anything about the check-up, and what she knows is that everything is going smoothly there. Probably as a result of this check-up they will say that they have not found serious violations there. “This is a process that is politically motivated and I believe it will stop soon, because it cannot be useful for anyone,” said S. Ghazaryan.
The director of the foundation says that in several days they will hold a press conference with the foundation’s lawyer Arthur Grigoryan.
Shortly after publication of information about legal proceedings against Civilitas foundation Eduardo Ernekyan, prominent Armenian businessman from Argentina donated $150,000 to the foundation. Shortly the foundation made a public announcement thanking all donors for their contribution to the organization. It seems that the foundation also thanked the government of Norway for approving a grant of $1,5 million, which would be provided starting from September. On June 14 a number of Ambassadors in Armenia, including Ambassadors of the USA and several European countries visited the Civilitas. With this action the international community made the Armenian government understand that the case against the foundation and former foreign affairs minister would be in their focus. Shortly after the noise the tension stopped, there was no information, which gave a reason to assume that the case was in deadlock. This means that the security services were ordered to launch a case against the foundation and former foreign affairs minister, but they cannot drive it forward due to the international community’s attention and failure to find serious violations. According to our information, the authorities are looking for ways out of that situation to prove that the institution of the legal proceeding was justified. RPA vice president Galust Sahakyan does not agree with this observation and assures that the authorities are never in deadlock. “To be honest, I am not informed about that case. The case is in process and you can get information from the investigation body,” said G. Sahakyan.
It is said that this case against Vartan Oskanyan is connected with the critics spoken by him recently and his political plans. The former FM has never denied the possibility of nominating his candidacy for president in 2013. There are rumors now that even he may be joint candidate supported by a number of parties. There are 6-7 months till the upcoming presidential election nomination and there is a big possibility that the political situation may change too. Thus, in this period the authorities must minimize all possible risks and dangers, including Oskanyan’s political advancement. However, it seems the launched criminal case did not frighten Oskanyan. Even after the criminal case was launched hi continues to slam the government’s projects and write criticizing announcements on his facebook wall. However, Galust Sahakyan assures that he cannot be a competitor with Serzh Sargsyn as their calibers are different. “Besides, we are supporting the idea of having competitors that can attract votes in order to give an opportunity to voters to choose. We welcome all candidates discussed by different parties. I think that the more candidates there are, the more competition there is, the easier it will be to prove the winner’s victory,” said G. Sahakyan.