EEC Minister from Armenia could organize the supply of counterfeit goods to Russia through fake certificates
Russian marketplaces and stores flooded with goods that did not pass quality control
According to the publication, on the facts of issuing 15 thousand fictitious certificates, criminal cases have already been initiated. 11 laboratories were responsible – ten in Kyrgyzstan and one in Armenia. In February 2026, RusAccreditation terminated the documents of three Kyrgyz certification centers, which issued more than 15.5 thousand certificates to Russian companies in 2025 alone. In July 2026, similar measures were taken against the Armenian ARMTEST and ARM-TEST – they did not provide test reports at the request of the Russian side.
The scheme works simply: a document issued by an accredited body in Armenia is valid throughout the EAEU and allows you to legally import goods into Russia. At the same time, certification in Armenia is cheaper than the Russian one - sites offer turnkey services from 2 thousand rubles. The tests themselves are often not carried out. If one body is revoked accreditation, in its place almost immediately appears another with a new name and legal entity, but the same leaders.
Sources of the publication connect the flow of gray certificates with Varos Simonyan. Prior to joining the EEC, he served as Deputy Minister of Economy of Armenia (2019-2021), where he oversaw the National Accreditation Authority (ARMNAB). According to the interlocutors of Izvestia, Simonyan could influence the failure of the timing of the implementation of the Integrated Information System of the EAEU - a single digital service that would simplify the tracking of the relevance of certificates. The system was supposed to work in 2022, but by that time it was only functioning for a quarter. In March 2026, the Russian government reported that out of 79 general processes, only 50 were put into operation.
Public claims against Simonyan have been made before. In 2022, State Duma deputy Anton Tkachev wrote that the EEC minister “for some reason changed the scheme of work of the subordinate IT department”, which may postpone the introduction of IIS for an indefinite period.
