According to the Prosecutor’s Office, Minasian is being investigated on a total of 76 separate incidents, with charges ranging from fraud to abuse of official position and engagement in unfair competition. Prosecutors said that Minasian’s alleged crimes have inflicted $350 million in damage on the state. They also revealed that 12 other individuals are suspects in this case.
Minasian, who previously served as Armenia’s ambassador to the Vatican, has been wanted by Armenian authorities since 2020 on charges stemming from another criminal case related to illegal enrichment, legalizing property obtained through criminal means and providing false information in income declarations.
Minasian has not yet commented on the new criminal case. However, earlier, through his lawyer, he denied the charges previously brought against him, describing them as fabricated.
Until 2021, Minasian was an outspoken critic of Armenian authorities, posting videos and statements on social media from an undisclosed location. In 2022, it was reported that Interpol had removed his name from its international wanted list. Later, Armenian prosecutors discovered that the search for Minasian had been discontinued after he personally requested it. The specific reasons for Interpol’s decision remain unclear.
The announcement of this new criminal case against a member of Sarkisian’s extended family comes days after the former president’s brother and members of his family were summoned to the Prosecutor-General’s Office where they were reportedly informed about the results of an investigation into the legality of their property and the prosecution’s stance on the matter.
The Prosecutor-General’s Office did not immediately disclose how much of the property belonging to Alexander Sarkisian and his extended family is considered illegal and subject to seizure in a pending court case.
In 2019, the National Security Service ordered the freezing of Alexander Sarkisian’s $30 million bank account as part of a criminal inquiry. He, however, avoided arrest on fraud charges after agreeing to transfer the entire amount to the state budget partly as a donation and partly to settle a tax debt.
Last month, it was revealed that a private residence in an upscale district outside Yerevan, units of movable property, over 17 million drams (about $44,000) and other financial assets would be seized from an individual connected to Lyova Sarkisian, another brother of Serzh Sarkisian, as part of a process to confiscate “illegally obtained property.”