Today a ceremonial session of collegium was organized in the Prosecutor’s Office dedicated to 106^th anniversary of formation of the Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Armenia and Prosecutor’s Office Employees’ Day and Nikol Pashinyan, RA Prime Minister, Anna Vardapetyan, RA Prosecutor General, Deputies of the Prosecutor General, members of the Collegium of the Prosecutor’s Office, prosecutors and others participated in the session.

Anna Vardapetyan congratulated employees of the Prosecutor’s Office on their professional holiday and mentioned.

“Mr. Prime Minister, we are thankful for your visit on this symbolic day and for accepting the invitation to participate in this ceremonial session of collegium of the Prosecutor’s Office.

We are thankful to the Government of the Republic of Armenia for their support in the continuous reforms directed at the increase of effectiveness of exercising the powers of the Prosecutor’s Office”.

Dear prosecutors

The citizen of the Republic of Armenia is the one, who evaluates the results of our work. The citizen of the Republic of Armenia is also the author of praise and criticism. I am sure that devotion and professionalism, due diligence and care, human-oriented and patriotic approaches in the work will decrease the public criticism and increase their trust in us.

Today, I want to tank each of you for your strength, integrity and professionalism, thank you.

Today, my speech will be devoted to the following three priorities of the Prosecutor’s Office—fight against corruption, confiscation of property of illicit origin and protection of the state and community interests.

The Prosecutor's Office has adopted a strict punitive policy in criminal proceedings on corruption crimes. In this context, the person committing corruption crimes shall be released from criminal liability based on remorse, exceptionally when the person committing the crime for the first time regretted, cooperated with the body conducting the proceedings and compensated the damage caused to state or community as a result of the crime.

The motion on releasing the person, who has committed a crime from criminal liability based on regret is rejected as a rule, in case the offender held a military position or ever committed a corruption crime or such a high latency crime, as receiving a bribe/election bribe, money laundering, etc.

The Prosecutor’s Office shall follow up the adoption of just decision on subjecting the person, who has committed a corruption crime to a just criminal liability, punishment or criminal legal intervention. In this context it is important to highlight, that the Prosecutor’s Office requires a type of punishment according whereof the person found guilty in committing corruption crimes shall be deprived of the right to hold certain positions or to be engaged in certain activity.

During the first quarter of 2024, 533 criminal proceedings were initiated in the Anti-Corruption Commiittee. Decision on dismissing the criminal proceedings was rendered with regard to 327 criminal proceedings and 67 criminal proceedings regarding 165 individuals were submitted to the court.

Under the mentioned criminal proceedings public criminal prosecutions were initiated with regard to 347 individuals, wherefrom public criminal prosecutions against 93 of them were initiated by the prosecutors on their own initiative.

The staff of the Department of Supervision over Legality of Pre-trial Proceedings in the RA Anti-corruption Committee of the Prosecutor General’s Office was almost completely changed and replenished with prosecutors having high professional background and qualities and most of them are young prosecutors.

On June 20, 2024, the first judicial act on the confiscation of property of illicit origin was rendered, according whereof the Anti-corruption court decided to confiscate from Gevorg Vardanyan, shareholder of “Poli-Transport” LLC— the subcontractor of the Armenian branch of Spanish Corsan-Corviam Construccion Company, which is the contractor of Tranch 1 and Tranch 2 sections of the North-South Road Corridor program, in favor of the Republic of Armenia one immovable property in Vahakni residential community  (average market value amounted to AMD 157 million), 2 transportation means, shares in two legal persons and a right to claim a loan in the amount of AMD 10 million as well as about AMD 17 million as a remainder of illicit income and an amount which was transferred to a bona fide purchaser or which was impossible to identify.

Examination of another statement of claim was completed. Now we are waiting for the opportunity to announce about the second judicial act.

A trial is pending regarding 14 statements of claims.

The Prosecutor General’s Office submitted 108 statements of claim in the field of confiscation of property of illicit origin and required to confiscate in favor of the Republic of Armenia more than 1150 immovable properties, 225 movable properties and shares in 305 legal persons having a criminal origin.

The total cost of submitted statements of claim is more than AMD 560 billion. Shares in some legal persons as well as market values of several other properties are not included in the cost of claim.

7 immovable properties, 1movable property and about AMD 687 million has been heretofore transferred under the ownership of Armenia based on the settlement agreements concluded in the scope of confiscation of property of illicit origin.

In the field of protection of state and community interests the Prosecutor’s Office entered into a qualitatively new stage. During the first quarter of 2024 the Department of State Interests Protection and structural subdivisions of the Prosecutor General’s Office continued the examination of cases regarding the use of parks and areas of common use as well as regarding the illegal alienation of areas not subject to alienation.

The Department of State Interests Protection of the Prosecutor General’s Office is carrying out an examination of lawfulness of registration of ownership right of the non-governmental organizations established in Armenia (having the same name) over the immovable property provided to non-governmental organizations operating during the Soviet years.

During 2024, based on the results of examination the Prosecutor’s Office submitted 9 reports on the crime and 17 statements of claim. 

During 2024, the Department of State Interests Protection carried out 81 examinations, and 29 reports on crime were submitted based on their results, 50 statements of claim were submitted to the court. 18 statements of claim were submitted by the Prosecutor’s Offices of Yerevan city, administrative districts of Yerevan city and regions. 

During 2024, several settlement agreements were concluded in the field of protection of state and community interests. 

In particular:

• A settlement agreement was concluded between the Prosecutor’s Office and “Sohocenter” LLC under the civil case pending before the Anti-corruption court of Appeal. As a result the right to conduct site development activity of the territory with the surface of 240 m² of the first and second floors of the complex located at 36/3 Koghbatsi Str., city of Yerevan and the right of the common shared ownership of the land plots corresponding to the mentioned surface shall be transferred to the Republic of Armenia as a compensation of obligation (construction of multifunctional complex “World of Books”) not fulfilled by the company. The market value of the mentioned territory is about AMD 1 billion and the annual lease payment transferred to the state is more than AMD 38 million.

• Based on two judicial acts that entered into legal force, the ownership right of the Republic of Armenia over the land plot with the surface of 6300m² located in Kotayk region shall be registered soon.

• The Anti-corruption court awarded one claim submitted by the Prosecutor’s Office on recognizing the auction invalid due to the fact that the land plot was alienated in violation of the law and a land plot with the surface of AMD 800 m² shall be returned to the Republic of Armenia after this decision enters into legal force.

• As a result of the written motion of the Prosecutor’s Office, the ownership right of the Republic of Armenia shall be registered over the land plot with the surface of 4310 m², with cadastral value approximated to market value (AMD 29 million) as well as over the immovable properties with the total surface of 511 m² built on the mentioned land plot and located at the park belonging to Gavar Children’s home.

• The courts awarded 8 claims on confiscation of AMD 4 billion 503 million 686 thousand (22 claims on confiscation of AMD 318 million 759 thousand during 2023).

• Here is one example—by its decision dated April 5, 2024, the Anti-corruption court awarded the claim submitted by the Prosecutor’s Office. Pursuant to the decision AMD 4.4 billion shall be confiscated from Samvel Mayrapetyan (businessman) and Gagik Hakobjanyan, Director of “Globus” LLC in favor of the Republic of Armenia.

Dear Mr. Prime Minister,

The abovementioned were the results of the first quarter of 2024 regarding three of the Priorities of the Prosecutor’s Office. Both the mentioned powers as well as other powers of the Prosecutor’s Office enshrined by the Constitution shall be exercised with the same diligence and responsibility”.

The Prime Minster also delivered a speech and congratulated the participants on their professional holiday. “I belive that justice is the most important expectation of the population of the Republic of Armenia, which we failed to completely address. With this regard it is difficult to assess the role of the Prosecutor’s Office in the country, in formulating a sense of fairness and justice. This is the problem I see and this is the problem I make our public administration system to face.We must not forget about this objective as justice was and is the most important expectation of the citizens of the Republic of Armenia, thus it is very important for the Prosecutor’s Office, investigative authorties and judicial system to follow this objective in their everyday work”, mentioned Nikol Pashinyan. 

The Prime Minister referred to the steps taken by the government in this direction and in that context emphasized the importance of raising the salaries of the Prosecutor's Office workers. The Head of the Government mentioned one more time that this reform was implemented not only for the employees of the Prosecutor’s Office but also for the citizens: “It is primarily done for the citizens as citizens are beneficiaries of the services provided by the Prosecutor’s Office, investigative authorities and courts. And we build our policy based on this logic, justice is the primary expectation of the population and there must be a standard for justice in the country. And for meeting that standard, new skills and professionalism must be introduced corresponding to those expectations and the employees must have an opportunity to focus on their work”.

According to the Prime Minister, in the past we had a logic of elitism both in the judicial system and in the state administration system, “Elitism here means that the the ones who work in the Government, Prosecutor’s Office and Courts are on a completely different dimension of life. Here I mean both social and socio-psychological factors, as those working in that sector are different people not related to those who live in the real Armenia every day and this gap is the reason of the lack of justice and the sense of deficit of justice. And I am happy that due to the reforms within the Government and the Prosecutor’s Office this logic of elitism decreases. And we can see that today, although very slowly, but the Prosecutor’s Office, investigative bodies and courts are becoming closer to the population and an organic connection is in process of formulation between the population and the Prosecutor’s Office”.

In that context, the Prime Minister emphasized the following thesis he had voiced—the cornerstone of the security strategy of the Republic of Armenia is legitimacy. “I am convinced of the importance and necessity of this thesis, every day. I would like to highlight that it is also connected with the standard of establishing justice and fairness in Armenia as one of the key phenomena connected with the prosecutorial activity and judicial system, which is directly connected with the sovereignty. And here we managed to reach to a creation of situation, where we have a reality, which does not cause deformations in this respect and this is an important precondition for having fairness and justice in our country”.

Referring to the creation of the institute of confiscation of property of illicit origin the Head of the Government highlighted the importance of resisting the emotions back in 2018: “Both than and now we had a political will for resisting emotions and creating an institute instead. Today we have already created an institute, which hereinafter belongs to people, to the Republic of Armenia and that institute must operate despite the government, as it is a mechanism launched completely in compliance with the law and that institute must also fill in the gap in justice, the perception whereof has been formulated among the citizens of the Republic of Armenia”.

Summarizing his speech Nikol Pashinyan mentioned that the reform in the field must serve the Republic of Armenia as well as the sovereign person of the Republic of Armenia—RA citizen. Prime Minister thanked the participants for working with such a will, vision and dedication.

After the speeches ten prosecutors participated in swearing-in ceremony and afterwards commemorative medals of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia was awarded to Rafayel Manukyan, Prosecutor of Yerevan city, Mher Aprikyan, Secretary General of the RA Prosecutor’s Office and honorary certificates of the Prime Minister of the Republic of Armenia were awarded to Aram Aramyan, Prosecutor of the Prosecutor’s Office of  Kentron and Nork-Marash Administrative Districts and Vardan Poghosyan, Prosecutor of Ararat region.

At the end of the ceremonial session several prosecutors were awarded commemorative watches, "105^th anniversary of the Prosecutor's Office" jubilee medals as well as “RA Prosecutor’s Office” award pins. A class rank on extraordinary basis was granted to two prosecutors.

Medals “For military cooperation” were awarded to several prosecutors by the order of Suren Papikyan, RA Minister of Defence and a commemorative watch and honorary certificates were awarded by the order of Armen Abazyan, Director of RA National Security Service.