How do you fight an election if you’re under house arrest? If you’re the Russian-Armenian businessman Samvel Karapetyan, once the richest ethnic Armenian in the world, you bring the election fight to you.

Since January, Karapetyan, leader of the Strong Armenia party, has been unable to leave his hilltop mansion to campaign ahead of Armenia’s parliamentary elections on Sunday. Last year, he waded into a fight between the Armenian Apostolic Church and the country’s prime minister, Nikol Pashinyan, leader of the Civil Contract party. His call for Pashinyan to stop pursuing clergymen critical of Pashinyan’s efforts to establish peace with neighbouring Azerbaijan was interpreted as a call to overthrow the government. Karapetyan was arrested, interrogated and spent six months in pre-trial detention before his sentence was commuted to house arrest. He denies the charge.

When we meet, the one topic Karapetyan wants to talk about is Nagorno-Karabakh

When we meet, the one topic Karapetyan wants to talk about is Nagorno-Karabakh

Karapetyan has since run Strong Armenia’s election campaign from his compound on the hill above the country’s capital Yerevan. Iron gates flanked by stone eagles open onto a driveway that leads up through an orchard of cherry trees and roses. At the top of the drive sits Karapetyan’s sandstone mansion, its front door framed by columns and an ornate semi-circular balcony.

Off to the side is the outhouse Karapetyan has converted into a conference hall – perfect for speaking to the press and (going by a cluster of miniature Armenian flags) meeting international delegations.

When we meet ten days before the election, Karapetyan, 60, is in a mischievous mood, even if his party is trailing in the polls with 15 per cent compared to Civil Contract’s 30 per cent. He asks that any photographs taken of him are good enough to make ‘all the girls in Europe fall in love with me’. But the conversation quickly turns serious. ‘Armenia has become the most dangerous country for doing politics in,’ he says, adding that he wants to ‘restore justice and fairness’.

Karapetyan is, to say the least, a controversial candidate. At the end of last month, western intelligence identified him as Vladimir Putin’s preferred candidate – something he denies any knowledge of. He is in the process of renouncing his Russian and Cypriot citizenships – a requirement to be eligible for the post of prime minister.

He has primarily stood on a conservative platform of strengthening Armenia’s economy (300,000 new jobs, lower taxes on small businesses, cheaper medicines).........

© The Spectator