How Vardanyan laundered money for Chubais Russian media investigation

Whatever is done in the dark eventually comes to the light one day, and the time-tested adage proved its worth once again when the Russian media broke the news about the involvement of Russian oligarch of Armenian origin Ruben Vardanyan in devising and implementing a money laundering scheme in Russia for oligarchs to dodge paying taxes.

Ruben Vardanyan, a dark horse in the South Caucasus until mid-2022, who out of the blue emerged in Karabakh in summer 2022 with a claim to the leadership role in the separatist Karabakh under the temporary control of the Russian peacekeeping contingent, was long ago suspected of similar activities. Funnily enough, soon after he appeared in Karabakh and began under diktat of certain Russian forces trouble the water, Azerbaijan accused him of involvement in money-laundering schemes.

Nevertheless, the objective of this article is not to delve into Ruben Vardanyan’s illegal activities in the region but to shed light on his role as a money-launderer in Russia, who, managed to devise various schemes there to inject public money into private bank accounts of oligarch and become a billionaire himself.

The Russian media carry a recording of a wiretap of one of Anatoly Chubais' conversations with Ilya Suchkov, an entrepreneur, who helped build Chubais' palace in Moscow Region. In this conversation, Chubais informs Suchkov that he instructed Ruben Vardanyan to devise and run a money laundering scheme for the sale of a mansion in Peredelkino near Moscow.

The main task set by Chubais to Vardanyan was to carry out "bewitching diplomacy" by Ruben Vardanyan to upgrade the scheme to reduce taxes. The $35-36 million mansion was to be sold to Chubais' associates, Boris Mints and his son, for $7-8 million through a Swiss shell company also owned by Chubais. The company then went bankrupt and voila as the Russian media investigation reveals.