YEREVAN. – Armenia’s City of Gyumri Mayor Samvel Balasanyan is conducting serious business activities in neighboring Georgia, Hraparak daily reports. 

“His warm relations with the representatives of Georgia’s legal system have enabled him to ‘expand’ into Georgia, too. Simultaneously with the beer factory he founded in Javakhk [Georgian name: Javakheti, is a predominantly-Armenian-populated part of Georgia’s southeastern Samtskhe-Javakheti Province], he is attempting to establish a fish farm in [Georgia’s] Ninotsminda [city] and build a restaurant complex for Armenian- and Georgian-brand food.    

‘Are these rumors true?’, we asked his spokesperson Zohrap Yeganyan. ‘Your information with reference to Mr. Balasanyan having areas and businesses in Georgia is false. And concerning the beer factory in Javakhk, Mr. Balasanyan does have his share in the construction of the factory because it is through his petition and request that an American investor has agreed to build a factory and create jobs in Javakhk, which is becoming devoid of its Armenian population’ [Yeganyan responded],” Hraparak writes.