BAKU, Azerbaijan, June 19. A few days ago, the French publication Le Figaro ran an article about Ruben Vardanyan, a Russian businessman of Armenian descent, who is notoriously known for his past leadership of Armenian separatists. It's worth mentioning that the original material was first published in the Armenian Armenews online magazine. The article reports that Vardanyan's relatives have appealed to the UN, making yet another defamatory claim against Azerbaijan.
After the events of September 19-20, when Azerbaijan liberated Khankendi, Vardanyan attempted to leave Karabakh along with other Armenians fleeing the region. However, he was caught and is currently detained by Azerbaijani security services, awaiting his sentence.
In response to Le Figaro's pro-Armenian piece, the French La Gazette du Caucase online publication revealed the truth about Vardanyan's activities before he became the "minister" of Karabakh separatists and what he was actually aiming for while in Azerbaijan.
"Le Figaro recently presented Ruben Vardanyan as an "Armenian philanthropist, nominated for the 2024 Nobel Peace Prize for his charitable and humanitarian activities." According to the newspaper, he "decided to settle in Karabakh after the 2020 war to help the local population." However, this narrative is skillfully constructed by Armenian nationalists," the article reads.
The authors reminded that, in March 2019, 22 members of the European Parliament called for an investigation into Vardanyan. Why exactly? "Born in Yerevan, Vardanyan is one of the richest men in Russia. After leaving Armenia, he amassed a considerable fortune in Moscow during the decade of gangster capitalism that followed the collapse of the Soviet Union. Parliamentarians accuse him of laundering billions of Euros on behalf of the Russian leadership through his native Armenia," they explain further.
From 2005 through 2022, Vardanyan headed the Troika Dialog investment bank, the article noted. The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) revealed that Troika Dialog had created a vast network of offshore companies that handled laundered money from Russia. Approximately $4.6 billion passed through 76 companies registered abroad. He then publicly renounced his Russian citizenship in 2022 to escape Western sanctions. Unlike most people who have made the same decision, he retained his assets, businesses, and bank accounts.
The article further noted that Vardanyan used his significant financial power to mobilize the Armenian diaspora and certain political supporters, particularly in France.
"He intensified his lobbying of the media and Western politicians to rally public opinion to the cause of Armenian Karabakh. Karabakh itself held little interest for him until he discovered the region's hidden wealth: two long-dormant gold mines that he reopened shortly after his arrival. He then seized the region's copper, molybdenum, and gold deposits, recognized by international bodies as belonging to Azerbaijan, and exploited them in violation of environmental regulations," the authors noted.
Vardanyan then launched a vast campaign to discredit Azerbaijanis who protested this cause with the support of nationalist diasporas, particularly in France, says the article. "He incited Armenians to participate in anti-Azerbaijani demonstrations, claiming that environmental protests masked a blockade organized by Baku to "starve" the Armenians of Karabakh. This campaign, based on the Azerbaijani "blockade" of the Lachin road, was widely reported in the French media, thanks to the complicity of certain journalists, media managers, and elected representatives. These figures find a convergence between Armenian extremism, which advocates an imaginary "civilizational conflict",and their own supremacist and Islamophobic ideology, as well as significant electoral interest given the political weight of the large French diaspora".
"Since then, Azerbaijan has reclaimed its territory in Karabakh and arrested "good Mr. Ruben." Azerbaijan and Armenia are now on the brink of achieving definitive peace. Only the diaspora, which has more members than Armenia has inhabitants, and a few journalists and politicians with vested interests, continue to respond to Vardanyan's media and financial influence. However, this will only be temporary, and the last stand of the oligarch's supporters will eventually falter in the face of peace," La Gazette du Caucase concludes.