Police uncover illegal business involving football stadium with 700,000,000 in concealed revenue

YEREVAN, OCTOBER 29, ARMENPRESS. The anti-organized crime department of Armenian police says it gathered factual information that the management of the V. Sargsyan Republican Stadium has been engaged in entrepreneurial activities without the Ministry of Finance’s permit from 2003 until 2018 July.

The stadium is operated by the Football Federation of Armenia.

Police said in a news release that a wholesale flower fair was organized at the venue and that the nearly 160,000 drams which was collected daily from tradesmen was only partially entered into the financial records.

Police said that according to the information they possess at this moment around 849,600,000 drams has been collected during the abovementioned period, and only 149,519,905 drams were formulated in the records, which means that 700,000,000 drams in revenue was concealed and nearly 100,000,000 in taxes were not paid.

An additional 10,000,000 drams in damages were inflicted in terms of the annual state duty for the license.

The investigation has also revealed that the stadium’s management has signed a lease contract with a businessman who has been engaged in wholesale flower trading in the stadium’s territory without the requested license from August 2018 up to date.

The persons through whom the businessman operated the activities have been detained.

The criminal case has been forwarded to the State Revenue Committee for further investigation.

Edited and translated by Stepan Kocharyan