Intrigue of the Day: Luzhkov's wife Baturina vs. Ashot Eghiazaryan

City Spy

More bad news for Russia's reputed richest woman, construction mogul Yelena Baturina, wife of the ex-Mayor of Moscow.

Following hubby Yury Luzhkov's departure as Mayor - during his tenure, she managed to win many lucrative tenders for city construction projects - the couple announced that they would in future school their teenage daughters Aleona and Olga in London. No sooner had Yelena touched down here than she was reportedly quizzed by British officials at the airport.

Now Baturina, Luzhkov and potash billionaire Suleyman Kerimov are embroiled in a court case in London. They're accused of involvement in a conspiracy against Russian parliament member and businessman Ashot Egiazaryan that saw a hostile takeover of his shares in the redevelopment of the landmark Moskva Hotel in Moscow.

Already, many of Kerimov's assets have been frozen under the £1.5 billion lawsuit filed by rival Egiazaryan in London's arbitration court. Kerimov is battling the freezing order. Watch this space.

*source: London's Evening Standard

Congratulations: we are officially a “medium-income country”

Well, apparently, this transition for Armenia from the “low-income country” to the “medium-income country” happened at the beginning of 2006. For this very reason, the UK government announced today suspension of its “assistance programme to Armenia”.

Taking into consideration that at the beginning of 2006 Armenia was included in the list of medium-income countries, and the assistance policy of the UK Department of International Development is mainly targeted at the implementation of programs in low-income countries, the UK Government has decided to suspend the assistance program to Armenia at the end of 2008.

Armenian government ‘affords’ $ 1 100 000 for celebrations

Lragir.am is “amazed” with the news that “in this difficult situation the government spends more than one million dollars” to set up the celebrations for the 90th anniversary of the Battle of Sardarapat:

“The Armenian government provided 339 million drams (about 1.1 million dollars) from the reserve fund for preparations and organization of the celebrations of the 90th anniversary of Sardarapat. 14.5 million drams will be allocated to the ministry of communication and transport for work on the square in front of the memorial to the battle, 230 million drams to the ministry of defence for reconstruction and repair, and 94 million drams to the ministry of culture to hold celebrations. […]

Perhaps the government has decided to simulate the battle at Sardarapat in every detail.”

I am with Lragir on this.

Without for a moment diminishing the significance of the Battle of Sardarapat for the future of Armenian nation and statehood, I am sure we can celebrate this anniversary in a much-much modest (in terms of allocated financial resources) and appropriate way. Spending millions of drams on a one-day (or so) celebration… I doubt that this is exactly what Armenian citizens expect from their government under the current challenging circumstances...

Truly amazing! (not surprising though...)

*photo - via Wikipedia

The power and value of Armenian capital

"International experts assess the Armenian capital, the combined Armenian capital of the world to be equal to $100 billion. When I told about this to a group of Armenian businessmen in Moscow, they smiled, these Armenian businessmen in Moscow smiled after hearing this figure, and said this much money they had themselves. (Laughter). I told about this to [...] a prominent businessman in the United States and the United Kingdom, and he said it's not true, it should be at least $300 billion.

Let it be not $300, not $200, let it be $100, OK? If we could attract at least 1% of these resources every year to Armenia, then within a short period of time there will remain no social problems in Armenia."

Armenian PM Serj Sargsyan, speaking to LA Times editorial board

P.S. He needs money, he needs investments. Fair enough.  If we could attract at least 1% of these resources every year to Armenia, conditional to democracy and human rights, then within a short period of time...