Helsinki Citizens’ Assembly-Vanadzor

The adoption of the law and the formation of the commission were included in 2019-2020 Action Plan deriving from the 2019-2023 Strategy for Judicial and Legal Reforms of the Republic of Armenia. However, it was not done in the set time.

On 25 May 2020, HCA Vanadzor published the measures envisaged by 2019-2020 Action Plan deriving from the 2019-2023 Strategy for Judicial and Legal Reforms of the Republic of Armenia to be implemented in 2019 and by the first quarter of 2020, which were either  not implemented or implemented in a way that was not envisaged.  

Among them was the RA Draft Law “On the Procedure of Forming and the Activity of the Fact-Finding Commission”. According to the Action Plan, the Draft Law was to be developed in the second half of 2019, while in the first quarter of 2020, the Commission was to be formed. As of May 25, the RA Draft Law “On the Procedure of Forming and the Activity of the Fact-Finding Commission” was not placed for public discussion.

On May 26, one day after our publication, Vice President of the RA National Assembly Lena Nazaryan informed on her Facebook page that the RA Draft Law “On the Fact-Finding Commission of the Republic of Armenia” and the related draft laws were placed on edraft.am for public discussion. 

She mentioned that the drafts would soon be put into circulation in the National Assembly. According to Lena Nazaryan, based on law, a commission would be formed, which should study facts of mass, regular violations of human rights during electoral processes, political persecutions, compulsory alienation of property and cases of servicemen’s deaths in non-combat state. The Commission should consider the possibility to restore the violated rights and in case new information emerges, the Commission should provide it to law enforcement bodies, propose institutional reforms and present the obtained information in a summary report to the public as an assessment of the past.