Armenia’s Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) today launched public criminal proceedings against Davit Papazian, a former director of the Armenian National Interests Fund (ANIF), Bella Manukyan, former director of Armenia’s Entrepreneur + State Anti-Crisis Investment Fund (ESIF), and Karineh Andreasyan, director of the CFW company.

The PGO announced the news in response to Hetq’s written request. All three organizations had come under media scrutiny for financial irregularities and mismanagement of state funds.

Davit Papazian is again in the news, this time internationally, given reports that he chairs the controversial Gaza Humanitarian Fund (GHF).

He served as ANIF’s executive director from 2019 until his dismissal in January 2024.  

In March 2025, Hetq revealed that on May 4, 2023, the Armenian government invested AMD 1.5 billion (around US$3.8 million) in a newly established company, CFW CJSC, led by an Andreasyan who has close ties to Yerevan Mayor Tigran Avinyan’s wife.

The company received the funds just eight days after its creation.

The money came from the Entrepreneur + State Anti-Crisis Investments Fund, established on May 22, 2020 by the Armenian National Interests Fund (ANIF), a foreign direct investment fund that operated under the government of Armenia.

CFW CJSC is owned by companies registered offshore in the U.S. state of Delaware.

ANIF was set up in 2019 and was dissolved in 2024, with Tigran Avinyan serving as its chair until 2022, when he was appointed deputy mayor of Yerevan.

Criminal proceedings against David Papazian are based on the following Criminal Code articles.

• forgery of documents, stamps, seals, forms or sale, preparation or use of false documents, stamps, seals, forms
• money laundering on a particularly large scale, committed by using official or official powers or the influence derived therefrom
• abuse of official powers or the influence derived therefrom in the private sector, which caused particularly large property damage

Criminal proceedings against Bella Manukyan are based on the following Criminal Code articles.

• forgery of documents, stamps, seals, forms or sale, preparation or use of false documents, stamps, seals, and forms 
• abuse of official authority or influence in the private sector, which caused particularly large property damage

Karineh Andreasyan faces charges of money laundering on a particularly large scale, committed by using government or official powers or the influence derived from them.

It is not yet known what preventive measures was selected for all three.