At the April 14 tax evasion trial of Nareg Hartounian, Judge Aleksandr Azaryan threw out a motion by the defense that state prosecutor Bagrat Petrosyan recuse himself.
It was revealed that she has two sisters working at the State Revenue Committee, one serving at a top-level position.
At today’s opening criminal trial of Nareg Hartounian, his defense lawyer, Hayk Alumyan, made a motion for the judge to recuse herself.
Hetq Chief Editor Edik Baghdasaryan said,"It all centers on the watch factory, in which the Hartounian family is the second largest shareholder.The shares are worth $8-10 million."
Today, Hartounian repeated that the tax officials should be going after the directors of GH Storage Enterprise who managed the company before he came on board in 2010 after they embezzled funds from the company.
“The case of Nareg Hartounian, in typical Armenian fashion, is one in which Armenia is regarded as a source of profits and, tragically, evasion of taxes goes hand in hand,” Alaverdyan said.
The RA Customs Agency has slapped a ban on all Tsar brand items imported by the Hartounian family’s GH Storage Enterprises company.
Mariam Mughdousyan, press affairs coordinator for the Hartounian family, says that tax evasion charges levelled against the directors of GH Storage Enterprises by the State Revenue Committee SRC) is merely an attempt to appropriate the assets of the family.
Employees of GH Storage Enterprises, a company owned by diaspora businessman Saro Hartounian, have gathered outside the State Revenue Committee office to demand that the agency lift its freeze on company bank accounts.