YEREVAN. – Irates newspaper of Armenia writes: According to our information, the Alaverdi copper smelting plant, which has been out of operation for about a year, has laid off some of its employees while has fired others, has passed to the Russian side, the VTB Bank.

Years ago, VTB demanded from Vallex [company] to pledge also assets and shares of the ACP company that operates the copper smelter in exchange for loans taken from the bank for the exploitation of the Teghut mine. At that time, however, the Teghut company did not exist as such—i.e. the enterprise, the huge factory and the expensive equipment were not available, so its market price was quite different from passing to VTB. Now that Teghut CJSC has passed to the bank, the Alaverdi copper smelter is in fact also in the hands of the bank.

It turns out that Teghut CJSC, with its infrastructures, production plant, is already of VTB, and the bank also took the copper smelter a couple of months ago.

“As such, the new LLC has not been formed yet. True, the copper smelter has a new director, Karen Ghazaryan, but it is still in the process of being organized. There was not just the smelter in the account of the ACP, so not all the premises and buildings passed to the bank. The charity cafeteria, the house of culture, and several other buildings are still in the balance of Vallex," Irate's interlocutor said.