“Why doesn’t any international human rights organization visit Artsakh?” Arman Tatoyan

The year 2020 has been an unprecedented burden for the Human Rights Defender’s institution, stated the Human Rights Defender Arman Tatoyan in the National Assembly, presenting the annual report on the activities of the RA Human Rights Defender in 2020, the state of protection of human rights and freedoms  and the annual report of the RA Ombudsman on the activities of the National Preventive Mechanism for 2020.

Both reports present the results of the Human Rights Defender’s activities and human rights issues during 2020, including the new coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic, the state of emergency.

Both documents total 1970 pages. Moreover, they do not include the dozens of extraordinary reports prepared by the Human Rights Defender in 2020.

During the presentation of the annual report on the activities of the Human Rights Defender, Arman Tatoyan emphasized the fact that during the war international organizations kept silent about human rights violations in Artsakh.

Presenting the annual report on the situation of human rights protection in Armenia, the Human Rights Defender mentioned that in comparison with 2015-16, the number of calls received to the hotline has increased more than 6 times.

He noted that human rights, such as pensions, calculation of length of service, definition of disability status, etc., are constantly violated due to poor administration in the field of social security.

It should be noted that in his annual report, the Human Rights Defender presented the human rights situation in all spheres of life, including, as in previous years’ reports, a detailed reference to the protection of women’s rights in the labor market, socio-economic, socio-political life, violence against women, women’s issues in the armed forces, women’s reproductive health, sex-selective abortion, hate speech.

In his final speech, Arman Tatoyan responded to the questions and concerns raised by the deputies.

Full text in Armenian