"Sanitek" accused Armenian authorities in an attempt to illegally  seize the company

ArmInfo.The initial intention  to hold a press conference in Tbilisi had one reason - the company  has been under severe administrative pressure for a long time.  Nicholas Tawil announced on August 2 in Yerevan during the video  conference by the director and owner of "Sanitek" company, operator  for sanitary cleaning of Yerevan -.

It should be noted that since last summer the situation with garbage  collection in the Armenian capital has sharply worsened and mountains  of garbage began to appear in the city, and public figures and  politicians are alarming about dangerous epidemiological risks.

At the press conference "Sanitek", explaining the current situation,  referred to the fact that the Municipality of Yerevan does not allow  the company to work. "One example of such pressure is a criminal case  initiated against the company in February of this year. This criminal  case is illegal and unreasonable, it is a political decision aimed at  scattering the company's funds, and then confiscating the company in  favor of the state by force", said the owner of the company, adding  that the authorities have repeatedly stated that they intend to  terminate the contract with the company ahead of schedule. And this,  according to Tawil, is a political decision.  Meanwhile, company  lawyer Armen Harutyunyan said that the criminal case under Article  205 of the RA Criminal Code against the company was initiated in  violation of all possible procedures, it is not justified and not  legal. As the lawyer said, according to provision 7, which remains in  force from the old law on foreign investments, in the event of any  legislative changes, a foreign investor has the right to either  continue to fulfill its obligations under the old conditions, or  under the new ones.

"So, in 2018, when the reform of the Tax Code was launched, we  appealed to the State Revenue Committee (SRC) to clarify whether  Sanitek can use clause 7 and continue payments according to the old  legislation and received a positive response. After the well-known  events in the republic in April-May last year, we again turned to the  appropriate structures with the same question, and also received a  positive response. And in February of this year, as it turned out, a  criminal case was opened against our company for tax evasion, on the  grounds that cannot use clause 7 of the law on foreign  investment. However, no sensible explanation was given for this, "the  lawyer said, adding that the company had already appealed this  decision, since it is illegal, due to the fact that there is no  corpus delicti, and the amount of alleged theft is about 280-290  million drams. He did not rule out conduct of illegal investigative  measures in the company. According to him, they also filed a lawsuit   against the mayor's office.  Meanwhile, to the remark of the  journalists, what is the reason that he decided not to come to  Yerevan, because he had been in the republic before and had not been  subjected to any persecution, Tawil confirmed that he was in Armenia  at the end of May and had no problems with leaving the country.  "However, this time the team of lawyers of the company advised me to  refrain from traveling to Yerevan. In addition, I would like to  clarify that until May of this year, we were not aware of a criminal  case opened against the company," the head of the company informed,  adding that so far they have developed two strategies to overcome the  current situation- the short-term and long-term one.

According to him, considering that the mayor's office has already  acquired several KAMAZ trucks and garbage cans the short-term  strategy envisages to combine the efforts of the mayor's office and  the company to solve this problem as soon as possible, to hold the  necessary discussions in this direction.  Within the long-term  strategy, according to Tawil,  Sanitek is ready to immediately invest  $ 4 million to buy garbage cans and buckets, and to buy 500 garbage  cans annually, and, if possible, upgrade transport, shift to  corporate governance with introduction of a horizontal monitoring  system. But in exchange for this, he said, the city administration,  for its part, must fulfill a number of conditions, namely, expand the  terms of the contract, pay fines, revise the terms of the contract,  develop the infrastructure at the Nubarashen landfill, develop and  implement a roadmap for political management, and also develop a  waste collection policy.  According to him, this was constantly  spoken about by the company, however, the mayor's office, both under  the old and the new authorities constantly dismissed these proposals.

The company also reported that since October last year, Sanitek has  been actively negotiating with the mayor's office to get out of this  situation, and it was agreed that the mayor's office will announce a  tender for the purchase of transport, and already in April the  vehicles will be delivered to the company's fleet in order to prevent  collapse in the summer season, However, in February of this year,  they suddenly received a written notice from the mayor's office about  the introduction of fines in case of not fulfilling the obligations,  which completely contradicted the spirit of the negotiations. "The  Mayor's Office also informed us that the tender for the purchase of  cars failed due to legal reasons. Then, the Mayor's office  unilaterally broke contact with us. Thousands of letters were sent.  We even wrote to the Prime Minister of Armenia, but our letters also  remained unanswered, they were simply redirected to the mayor's  office. Despite the fact that we had warned and urged the mayor to  find a solution to this problem since last year, we were ignored.  Moreover, we had more than one meeting with representatives of the  mayor's office and asked for a secretary who would record all those  meetings , but we were always refused'', said the head of the  company.

He also assured that the circulated information that the company's  shareholders allegedly include a representative of the previous  authorities is a deliberate sabotage and obvious lie, since the  company has always refrained from participating in political  processes. They also disagree with the fact that the company does not  manage to carry out the garbage collection process by itself,  recalling that they have worked in  Armenia since 2014 and in the  early years of their activities they did not face such problems, and  they were highly appreciated by the citizens in cleaning the city.  However, the promised conditions in practice turned out to be much  worse and more complicated, which led to rapid wear of equipment and  increased costs.  Sanitek also declared that the information of the  mayor's office on the company's obligations to provide the capital  with 16 thousand garbage cans is not true. The matter concerns 8  thousand for the entire term of contract. But the company was already  forced to purchase and place 10 thousand tanks. They also pointed out  numerous cases of arson of garbage cans and their theft, which also  increases costs. In total, as stated by Sanitek, the company has  invested about 20 million euros in the infrastructure of garbage  collection in Yerevan.  To recall, earlier the mayor of Yerevan Hayk  Marutyan gave an interview to Civilnet TV, in which he spoke about  the current situation around garbage disposal. In particular, the  mayor stressed that the fleet of Sanitek company, which is  responsible for garbage collection and sanitation of streets, is in  an inadequate condition, to put it mildly, which, in his opinion, due  to the fact that the relevant work was not carried out properly,  investments were not implemented. ''We provided funds in a timely  manner, which means that they were required to conduct their work  properly'', he stressed.

According to Marutyan, the company's problems began in 2017, the peak  of which fell in the summer of 2018. "I have repeatedly appealed and  called for Sanitek to renew its transport, to provide the necessary  number of cans in the city, the number of which is about 5 thousand,  instead of the necessary 16 thousand," he said.  In addition, the  mayor said that as a result of the work done at the end of July,  Yerevan will be provided with additional garbage trucks, although  according to the contract the vehicles should have been in Yerevan  only in September. ''I will try to quickly resolve this issue'',  he  stressed.