As a result of the coordinated work and initiative of the units of the prosecutor's office in particular, the Department for the protection of State interests of the General Prosecutor's Office of the Republic of Armenia and territorial prosecutor's offices in the field of the protection of State property interests, during 2018 the mechanisms of corruption abuses used in almost all regions of the country, which have been carried out over a long period of time in the process of implementing the State assistance program to provide land and fertilizer users at affordable prices have been disclosed.
In addition, measures are being taken to return budget loans from debtor companies involved in the supply of fertilizers and seeds. In particular, as a result of the research conducted by the State Interests Protection Department of the General Prosecutor’s Office, it turned out that according to data for March 2017, 1 billion 112 million 415 thousand drams have not been returned to the state budget from fertilizer-allocated budget loans to suppliers, and as to the seeds, 673,895.752 drams have not been returned to the SNCO "Seed Agency" .
Based on the report of the Prosecutor General's Office of the Republic of Armenia the RA Ministry of Agriculture and Finance have taken measures as a result, the balance of debt of companies in the field of fertilizers, as of May 2, 2018, has been amounted to about 396,000,000 drams. That is, according to the results of work carried out about 700 000 000 drams have been returned to the state budget.
SNCO "Seed Agency" has appealed to regional courts of general instance demanding to recover from the regional administrations about 663 million drams. Subsequently, the government has forgiven debts in the amount of 165 million drams in the area of fertilizers and 642 million drams in the area of seeds, reducing by that amount the credit obligations of suppliers to the State budget. At the same time, the debt in the amount of 31.847.700 drams has not been forgiven, since it has been allocated in excess of the stipulated quota.
As a result of the work done, it has turned out that program beneficiaries have often been unaware of the program and in fact did not participate in it or fulfilled commitments that have not been transferred by community leaders to the State budget, after which they have submitted fake data on participation or non-performance of obligations that the government has forgiven.
On the fact of flagrant crimes, 25 criminal cases have been initiated on fertilizer and 49 criminal cases on seeds on the grounds of article 308 (Abuse of official authority), article 314 (official forgery) , article 315 (official negligence), parts 2 and 3 of the article 179 (squandering or embezzlement) of the RA Criminal Code.
The amount of damage in the initiated criminal cases has been amounted to about 92,947,440 drams. Four officials have been detained within the framework of criminal cases, criminal proceedings have been initiated against 18 officials. The amount of damage compensated during the investigation has been about 32 million drams.
