Armenian anti-corruption chief defends election bribery wiretaps

Armenia’s anti-corruption chief on Wednesday defended the authenticity of wiretap recordings at the center of election bribery investigations, saying none of the hundreds of people questioned by authorities has disputed their validity.

Speaking three days after the country’s parliamentary elections, Anti-Corruption Committee Chairman Artur Nahapetyan said investigators have opened approximately 115 criminal proceedings and questioned hundreds of people.

“Not a single person has stated during questioning that the recordings were falsified or provided information suggesting they were fabricated,” Nahapetyan said.

He also dismissed allegations that the recordings had been selectively edited or taken out of context.

“I can assure you that no excerpt has been presented out of context,” Nahapetyan said. “Only the portions relevant to the investigation were made public. The conversations concerned specific instances of vote-buying involving political actors.”

Nahapetyan said the recordings will be submitted as evidence in court. He added that authorities have already brought 14 criminal cases involving 54 individuals.

The recordings were made at various times before their release, ranging from a day earlier to several months earlier, he said. However, Nahapetyan argued that the timing was largely irrelevant, noting that investigative bodies typically release such material when carrying out enforcement actions or advancing a case.

Addressing criticism that the authorities had not conducted similar surveillance in response to allegations of administrative resource abuse during the election campaign, Nahapetyan said such matters fall outside the Anti-Corruption Committee’s jurisdiction.

“The use of administrative resources is not within the Anti-Corruption Committee’s mandate,” he said. “Wiretaps are authorized on the basis of operational intelligence indicating that an individual or a political group is involved in distributing or receiving election bribes. Those operational findings provide the legal grounds for surveillance measures.”