Armenian Justice Minister disagrees with US Ambasador critics
ArmInfo.Arpine Hovhanisyan, the Armenian Minister of Justice, doe not share the opinion expressed by Richard Mills, the United States Ambassador to Armenia. This was stated in respons to ArmInfo reporter question.
"I don't think that it is fair to deny the fact that a number of draft laws, aimed at the corruption struggle and adopted by the Parliament recently, have been discussed and developed based on the results of Anti Corruption Board activities, and the appropriate instructions were issued exactly by that entity," the Minsiter stated.
According to Hovhannisyan, all this once again states the fact that authorities and the Government of Armenia do ess their political will in respect to the corruption struggle and implement appropriate steps. " In this respect, I don't think that there is a need to call a separate press conference for this issue and to voice certain messages, especially within considering the fact that solutions for many problems accentuated by Ambassador, are found and defined already," Hovhannisyan mentioned and reminded, that illegal enrichment criminalization is an effective and strong tool for corruption struggle. As another tool, the Minister mentioned the development of regulatory package on cash transactions restrictions . "Beside that, the Anti Corruption Board has reviewed and given a positive resolution to the approval on expansion of the persons affiliated to officials, who should also submit revenue statements," the Minister stated.
Referring to the Ambassador's suggestion regarding independent Anti Corruption entiry, Hovhannisyan reminded that according to the instruction of President Serzh Sargsyan, the appropriate working team is already close to the completion of such entity in the structure of the Ethics Committee, which will be granted large responsibilities to provide adequate response to the violations fetched out.
" I hope my response has softened the concerns of American diplomat, and showed that anti corruption arrangements contained in the Program of the Government of Republic of Armenia, do conform to both EU and America Embassy priorities, as well as to priorities of our other partners. To remind, recently the US Ambassador Richard Mills stated at his press conference, that U.S. Embassy witnessed some troubling trends in the areas of human rights and rule of law over the past 15 months that give cause for real concern, U.S. Ambassador to Armenia Richard Mills said in his remarks to American Chamber of Commerce of Armenia in Yerevan on Feb 1. "Despite some progress and notable success stories which give reason for hope, we have also witnessed some troubling trends in the areas of human rights and rule of law. Let me first mention some of Armenia's very laudable successes in this area. One of the most impressive is the fact that it retained its status as a Tier I country in the State Department's Trafficking in Persons Report for the fourth straight year, thanks in large part to its interagency working group, which is a model of cooperation between the government and civil society," the Ambassador said.
Richard Mills also addressed the events of Erebuni (seizure of a police compound by Sasna Tsrer (Daredevils of Sassoon) - editor's note) last July. "During much of the 15-day standoff, Armenia's law enforcement struck a good balance in terms of securing Armenians' safety and security around an active site, while defending Armenians' rights to peacefully protest. However, we were deeply concerned by the credible reports of excessive use of force used by the police against unarmed protestors and journalists on July 29-30. We made our concerns clear at that time, noting that such actions violated press freedom and the rights of Armenian citizens to the freedom of expression and of peaceful assembly," Ambassador Mills said. Another area of concern which the fallout of Erebuni highlighted, has been the Government's use of pre-trial detention, he said. "I will be frank that in the case of Erebuni and other politically sensitive cases this year, we are concerned by the pre- trial detentions of several defendants who participated in the demonstrations or are suspected of giving non-violent support to the militants, but were not involved in the actual armed seizure of the police station or in the deaths of the policemen. Let me be clear, my intention in mentioning these cases is not to prejudge their guilt or innocence, but to emphasize that each pre-trial detention decision must be based on a strong, fully transparent legal rationale," he noted