It took a year for Armenian law enforcement officials to close a sand mine owned by the wife of the ruling Civil Contract party MP Sergey Bagratyan.

Hetq first wrote about the mine, in Armenia’s Ranchpar village (Ararat Province) in November 2023.

Bagratyan, who graduated with a geology degree from Yerevan State University, served as a Prosperous Party MP from 2019-2021 before joining PM Nikol Pashinyan’s Civil Contract party.

Naira Hakobyan. Bagratyan’s wife, formed a company and launched work at the mine without proper environmental permits.

Following Hetq’s exposé , she transferred her shares in the company to a family friend.

Bagratyan, in 2021, served on an Armenian government oversight committee tasked with looking into the possible misallocation of money collected by the Hayastan All-Armenian Fund to aid Armenians in Artsakh following the 2020 Azerbaijani military offensive.

Bagratyan continues to serve as a Civil Contract MP.