Former Economy Minister Vahan Kerobyan was taken into custody today in connection with an ongoing criminal case involving a high-value procurement tender at the ministry. Kerobyan’s brother, Avetik Kerobyan, confirmed the arrest and said law enforcement officers conducted a search of his home.
Kerobyan is accused of abusing his official powers by disqualifying a lower-priced company for a tender, and steering it instead towards the Armenian subsidiary of international software company Synergy International and its significantly higher bid in 2023. Kerobyan has denied all wrongdoing.
In February 2024, the Anti-Corruption Court placed Kerobyan under house arrest for two months as a pre-trial measure. He appealed the decision and weeks later was released from house arrest, though the charges stuck. At that time he described the case as politically motivated and said prosecutors were ‘focusing on advancing a preconceived hypothesis at any cost’.
His recent detention came after the authorities launched their investigation in January, with law enforcement agencies raiding more than 15 premises including the ministry and residences of officials. Several ministry officials and executives of Synergy were initially arrested; by mid-2024 charges against six defendants had been dropped, while Kerobyan and the company’s director remained under prosecution.
Kerobyan served as Economy Minister from 2020 until February 2024, through the COVID-19 pandemic, the Second Nagorno-Karabakh War, and a subsequent major economic reform agenda.
Kerobyan’s allies argue that the case follows his disagreements on key projects and procurement deals at the ministry.
Kerobyan dismisses the charges, with his lawyers and himself claiming that they are fabricated.
‘The only motivation to go to work is to do good deeds’, he told journalists in 2024. ‘When your work, which comes with a much lower salary than market value, is treated like this in the end, then the little thing you could have hoped for — to provide your children and family with good treatment from people — is destroyed in one swoop’.
Arshaluys Barseghyan
