By Trend

Russian billionaire of Armenian origin Ruben Vardanyan, currently hiding in Karabakh, is illegally smuggling gold.

As Trend has learned, the situation on the Lachin road is far from what local Armenians are trying to present it as.

Azerbaijani environmentalists were supposed to monitor gold and copper mines in Karabakh, on which an agreement was reached with Russian peacekeepers temporarily stationed in the area. However, when the Azerbaijani delegation arrived at the site, the Armenian activists emerged, and crashed the monitoring process.

Following this, a protest action of Azerbaijani activists, NGO's and environmentalists took place near the post of Russian peacekeepers in the vicinity of Shusha, who demanded that the Russian command allow representatives of Baku to do the monitoring.

Amid all this, the Armenian side is trying to present the current situation as a “humanitarian crisis”.

The mentioned Ruben Vardanyan, a Russian billionaire of Armenian descent who calls himself the "Minister of State of Karabakh" talks about "crisis faced by thousands of people."

At the same time, a source told Trend, Vardanyan did not break his ties with Russia. He renounced his Russian citizenship but retained his business and assets in Russia. In 2022, he fled from Western sanctions to Karabakh and began to engage in illegal mining and export of gold from there.

This explains Vardanyan's stubbornness and the Armenians' attempts to present the situation in the Lachin corridor as a "humanitarian crisis."

Basically, some 25,000-30,000 Armenians living within the zone of temporary control of Russian peacekeepers have become hostage of illegal business of the Russian billionaire.

The Armenians in Karabakh themselves aren't too happy with Vardanyan, and it is getting worse. People accuse him and his people of the fact that because of their business, ordinary people are forced to endure hardships and losses.