"Brest Beer" Was Taken Away From Lukashenko's Armenian Friend
- 6.03.2026, 15:27
It became known about the plans of the new owners.
"Brest beer" seems to have been taken away from Lukashenko's Armenian friend - oligarch Gagik Tsarukyan - and sold to new owners. At the same time, the bankruptcy procedure was terminated. The "Zerkalo" learned about it from the documents published in the Unified State Register of Bankruptcy Information. In the meantime, the plant has already renovated its production facilities and upgraded the bottling lines.
What the court decided
February 20 this year, the Economic Court of Brest voblast dismissed the case of financial insolvency of Brest Beer. This follows from the data published in the Unified State Register of information on bankruptcy. The representative of the company referred to the fact that the creditors failed to agree on a liquidation plan by the end of the term of bankruptcy proceedings.
For reference. Bankruptcy proceedings are a stage of bankruptcy, which is launched in order to pay off creditors and protect the rights of all parties. If the debtor cannot be rehabilitated, its liquidation is started.
At the same time, as it is stated in the court document, by order of Alexander Lukashenko in October 2025, the company was taken away from the previous owner and sold to a new one - the company "Brest Beer and Drinks" founded last year. Since it's a closed joint-stock company, it's impossible to find out the owners from public sources.
We recall that since 2020, the main stake in Brest Beer belonged to the Bulgarian company Multigroup Trade OOD, part of the Armenian concern Multi Group, owned by businessman Gagik Tsarukyan. He was supposed to invest at least 25 million rubles in the modernization of the enterprise and repay debts worth 10 million rubles within 10 years. However, he failed to bring the plant to plus.
Gagik Tsarukyan has maintained friendly relations with Alexander Lukashenko for many years. In particular, the businessman congratulated the dictator "on his victory" in the 2020 elections.
The company's managing director Oleg Grib said in a commentary to a local TV channel:
- Last year we became the owners of this plant and already in November we started our production activities. We formed the backbone of the labor collective, the advantage was given to the old employees of the plant, today there are already 110 people. We have started repair of production areas, production lines have been renewed, now we have purchased a line of bottling into glass bottles, we are installing it, the works on the line into tin containers are already in progress.
New company has received trade marks of the enterprise's products.
The plant plans to establish production of a wide range of beverages: it will produce beer, kvass, wine, low-alcoholic and non-alcoholic products, as well as juices, drinking and mineral water.
In the meantime, it was previously reported that Brest Beer was going to be sold to Medovye Beverages, which rented the production facilities. The owner of the latter - Andrei Khilkevich - was formerly the director of the Minsk Grape Wine Factory and had experience of working at the CIS enterprises, as well as created the production of drinks in Grodno region.
The bankruptcy case of Brest Beer began to be considered in March 2025. The tax inspectorate appealed to the Economic Court of Brest region. It demanded to recover from the company "Brest Beer" almost 2.8 million rubles in favor of the state budget. The agency asked to include this amount in the list of debts of the company, subject to repayment. At the same time, the deadline for accepting claims from creditors had already been completed. Nevertheless, on October 29, the court upheld the position of the tax authorities and granted its application.
The debts of the alcohol producer were discovered by the State Audit Office during an unscheduled inspection. Of the total amount of almost Br2.8 million, about Br642.4 thousand were accrued penalties.
According to local television, the company also owed Br1.5 million to its employees.