The Armenian government completed on Thursday the nationalization of a luxury hotel handed over to it by a former senior official facing a corruption investigation.
The Golden Palace hotel located in the resort town of Tsaghkadzor has until now belonged to Armen Avetisian, a former chief of the Armenian customs service, and his family. They offered to donate it to the state last November after the National Security Service (NSS) moved to prosecute Avetisian for illegal entrepreneurship and money laundering.
The NSS claimed in October 2018 that Avetisian financed the construction of a similar five-star hotel in Yerevan when he headed the State Customs Committee (SCC) from 2001-2008. The financing was carried out through an obscure company registered in Cyprus and falsely presented as foreign investment, it said.
It remains unclear whether Avetisian was formally charged afterwards.
In February this year, the then NSS director, Artur Vanetsian, said that the Tsaghkadzor hotel’s transfer to the state is “in progress.”
The government completed that process at a weekly meeting chaired by Deputy Prime Minister Tigran Avinian. The latter said that the government should decide before the end of this year what to do with the presently disused property.
Armenia’s State Property Management Committee estimates the hotel’s market value at around $16.5 million. The head of the government agency, Narek Babayan, said some investors have already offered to buy it at a higher price.
“But I believe that an auction would be the best option in case of a sale [of the hotel,]” Babayan told reporters after the cabinet meeting.
The NSS launched the investigation into Avetisian shortly Vanetsian alleged that former President Robert Kocharian and his family accumulated hundreds of millions of dollars worth of assets when he ruled Armenia from 1998-2008.
Kocharian dismissed the allegations, challenging law-enforcement authorities to prove them. In an August 2018 interview, he also insisted that Avetisian did not make a huge personal fortune while in office.
The former customs chief faced corruption allegations by opposition figures and media throughout his tenure.
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