Interpol’s General Secretariat has officially put former Russian lawmaker Ashot Yegiazaryan on its wanted list over large-scale fraud charges, a spokesman for Russia’s Investigative Committee said on Thursday.
Yegiazaryan, a member of the Liberal Democratic Party (LDPR), is accused of embezzling more than 500 million rubles ($16.2 million) from a former acquaintance for the construction of a trade center in Moscow and the renovation of the Moskva Hotel adjacent to Red Square.
“As a part of this criminal case, Interpol’s General Secretariat has put Ashot Yegiazaryan on its wanted list. The investigation is underway,” spokesman Vladimir Markin Markin said.
Investigators say in 2003 Yegiazaryan suggested that Mikhail Ananyev, the former deputy head of the Federal Agency for State Property Management (Rosimushchestvo), invest in the facilities in exchange for a stake.
Yegiazaryan is also believed to have fraudulently acquired the right to 20% in shares worth over 1.5 billion rubles ($48.7 million) in a joint stock company that runs a Moscow shopping and leisure complex.
In November 2010, the lower house of the Russian parliament stripped Yegiazaryan of his political immunity following a request by Russian Prosecutor General Yury Chaika. It was only the fourth time a lawmaker has been stripped of immunity since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
In late 2010, the former lawmaker was put on the international wanted list. Media reports say the ex-lawmaker is now living in the United States.
MOSCOW, May 19 (RIA Novosti)