On 2 February, a new criminal case was opened in Armenia on the fact that a  Ministry of Defence employee hindered the work of a lawyer representing the interests of the Russian arms company ORSIS in Armenia, reported news.am. 

The grounds for initiating a new criminal case was supported by the SIS materials. They state that after the first criminal case regarding the failed tender was opened by the main military investigation department of the Armenian Investigative Committee, the assistant to one of the deputy defence ministers of Armenia tried to persuade the ORSIS lawyer to refuse complaints filed by law enforcement.

The lawyer in question was Alexander Sirunyan from ORSIS. He said that he applied to the National Security Service last year to report on the failure of the tender. 

“[The] assistant to the deputy defence minister Makar Ghambaryan [went] to me a few times in [the] fall, stressing that if the parties reconcile the issue of tender would probably be settled too… I was offered to step back from complaining and even write that I was mistaken,” Sirunyan said, adding that he rejected the offer. He said that last year, as a sign of friendship ORSIS presented to the Ministry of Defence a Marocchi SI 12 rifle, which was though registered in the name of the Deputy Minister.

Spokeswoman for the SIS of Armenia, Marina Ohanjanyan, confirmed the fact of initiating a new case according to the ORSIS statement, without specifying details.

On 26 August, a criminal case based “on negligent attitude to service” was opened in Armenia because of a disruption of the tender for the supply of weapons in which ORSIS participated (Caucasus Watch reported). Afterwards, ORSIS was included on a list of blacklisted companies in Armenia. On 10 December, the Yerevan court of general jurisdiction decided to remove ORSIS from the blacklisted companies (Caucasus Watch reported).