Alexander Pracht
A Russia-born U.S. entrepreneur with extensive business interests in Armenia was appointed last Friday as chair of a U.S. State Department enterprise fund that will oversee more than $200 million in investments into the so-called “Trump Route” expected to run through Armenia’s southern Syunik province.
According to public records, Konstantin Sokolov, a Chicago-based investor who will head the fund, has donated more than $12 million to Republican campaigns and entities associated with U.S. President Donald Trump. He was also among the donors who collectively contributed more than $350 million to Trump’s White House ballroom project – though his exact contribution is unclear – and, like many other donors, later received a government position.
The Guardian, which first reported the news, said Sokolov declined to comment on the matter, while the White House referred questions to the State Department, which has not provided immediate details.
The initiative, known as TRIPP, was first announced last August, when Armenia’s Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan and Azerbaijani President Ilham Aliyev signed a peace declaration at the White House mediated by the United States. Both countries also signed bilateral agreements with Washington. Under the deal, Armenia agreed that the U.S. would invest in the “Trump Route for International Peace and Prosperity,” a transport link connecting mainland Azerbaijan with its Nakhichevan exclave through Armenia’s Syunik province.
Also read: EXPLAINER: New details behind the ‘Trump Route’ deal
The project is expected to include both a highway and a railway, restoring a Soviet-era link that has been severed since the early 1990s following the war in and around Nagorno-Karabakh. Yerevan will retain full sovereignty over its territory in Syunik, including its border with Iran.
While the United States will have no military presence, it will hold extensive business interests in the area, which are expected to help deter a potential Azerbaijani aggression, particularly in Syunik, which is sandwiched between Azerbaijani territories to the east and west.
“The TRIPP fund […] means that a lot of private capital is going to flow into building railroads, into building pipelines and, again, into building the interconnectedness that will create real prosperity for the region but also allow the peace agreement to stick,” U.S. Vice President JD Vance said in Yerevan in February following a meeting with Pashinyan.
Four U.S. foreign assistance experts told The Guardian that it is customary for the White House to appoint the board of U.S. enterprise funds. They added that the fund would be subject to statutory requirements, including annual reporting and independent audits to ensure transparency and accountability, as well as grant provisions covering conflicts of interest.
Who is Konstantin Sokolov?
Born in Soviet Russia, Sokolov went to college in Saint Petersburg before emigrating to the United States in the late 1990s. He later founded IJS Investments, a Chicago-based private equity firm specializing in “future-ready” energy and telecommunications.
In Armenia, Sokolov is the controlling shareholder of Viva, one of the country’s largest mobile operators, which he acquired from Russia’s MTS telecom holding in 2024 – however, an investigation by the Armenian outlet Hetq has suggested he might not be the real owner.
Radio Free Europe also reported last week that Sokolov has acquired a 49.9% stake in the Teghut copper and molybdenum mine, Armenia’s second-largest mining operation located in the northern Lori region.
Also read: Russian bank exits Armenia's Teghut mine as investigation identifies new controlling owners
Sokolov purchased the shares from the Russian state-owned bank VTB, which in recent years had struggled to invest in the mine due to Western sanctions imposed following Russia’s full-scale invasion of Ukraine in 2022.
Washington has laid out critical mineral procurement as a central aspect of a strengthened Armenia-U.S. relationship, which includes a rare earths deal the two countries signed in May. With Sokolov already involved in the Armenian mining sector, his experience in mining could be indicative of this orientation.
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