#Fake News: False Charity Theft Claim Against Armenian PM’s Wife

Hayk Hovhannisyan, #CivilNetCheck

A fabricated story claiming that Armenian Prime Minister Nikol Pashinyan's wife, Anna Hakobyan, embezzled $3.4 million from a children's cancer charity has been spreading across social media since August 15.

The false claim originated from a newly created website called EU Leaks, which alleged that Archbishop Bagrat Galstanyan, who now leads the charity, was about to expose the supposed corruption when he was arrested by authorities. The story suggested this was the real reason behind his detention.

CivilNet's fact-checking investigation found that the website spreading this information is fake and the claims are entirely baseless.

The Fake Website

EU Leaks published the article titled "Corruption Scandal: Pashinyan's Wife Drained $3.4M from Children's Cancer Fund" on August 13. The piece was attributed to James Creedon, supposedly a journalist.

Our investigation revealed that the euleaks.eu website was created just two days before the article's publication, on August 11, 2025. While a legitimate EU transparency platform previously operated under this domain, the current site has no connection to that project.

Key Evidence Against the Claim

James Creedon, who actually works for France24, categorically denied authoring the article when contacted by CivilNet. "I did not write this article. According to my source, the website was created using artificial intelligence," he stated.

Lawyer Sergey Harutyunyan, cited in the fake article as confirming the corruption scheme, publicly refuted this on August 16, stating he never made such claims.

The fake article claimed that a "recent audit" revealed the $3.4 million embezzlement. However, the City of Smile Foundation's official 2024 independent audit report, available on their website, shows no violations or misappropriation of funds. The audit was completed "without reservations."

Archbishop Galstanyan, who replaced Hakobyan as chairman of the foundation's board of trustees, has never spoken about any financial irregularities during his tenure.

How the Disinformation Spread

The fake story followed a familiar pattern. After appearing on the bogus EU Leaks site, it was picked up by Azerbaijani media outlet Haqqin.az on August 14, then by Armenian opposition websites the following day. By August 18, it had spread widely through Russian propaganda networks, including News.ru, Crimea-news.com, and various pro-Russian Telegram channels.

This incident fits a broader pattern of coordinated disinformation campaigns targeting Armenia's government. Previous investigations by CivilNet and the Atlantic Council's DFRLab have exposed similar fake stories about "secret U.S. biolab experiments," "pharmaceutical testing" on Armenians, and Pashinyan allegedly purchasing a villa in France.

These campaigns typically use newly created websites that mimic legitimate news outlets or organizations to lend credibility to their false claims. The $3.4 million embezzlement story about Anna Hakobyan is entirely fabricated, following this same deceptive playbook.

The timing of this disinformation campaign coincides with ongoing political tensions in Armenia, where Archbishop Galstanyan has been leading opposition protests against the government since early 2024. His actual arrest in August 2025 was related to charges of organizing mass disorders, not to any corruption revelations.