What kind of reforms have been made in the judicial and legal, anti-corruption and human rights protection sectors? The Deputy Minister of Justice is in the National Assembly

Deputy Minister of Justice Kristinne Grigoryan participates in parliamentary hearings on the implementation of the EU-Armenia Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement convened in the National Assembly.

During her speech, the Deputy Minister presented the reform agenda, the main directions envisaged by the Agreement and touched upon the strategic visions of the Government, outlining the Judicial and Legal Reforms, Anti-Corruption and Human Rights Protection, Penitentiary and Probation Sector Strategies and the actions envisaged by each. According to Deputy Minister Grigoryan, all the strategies were developed in a participatory and inclusive way, discussions were provided in the marzes, financial assessments were made, strategic communication plans were approved.

Among the measures envisaged by the Judicial and Legal Strategy, Kristinne Grigoryan highlighted certain steps of the constitutional and electoral legislation reforms, the scope and directions of the application of the toolkit for transitional justice, as well as the activities aimed at ensuring the independence, impartiality and efficiency of judges. As for the latter, the Deputy Minister specified that they refer to the clarification of the procedures for qualification test and appointment of judge candidates, the process of disciplinary liability of judges and SJC members, the procedure for the assessment of integrity, besides, they targeted the issues concerning the increase in the number of judges and the strengthening of social guarantees, the reduction of the high work-load and observance of actually reasonable time limits for examination of cases, the problems with the use of e-justice tools and the improvement of the accountability mechanisms for the judiciary.

It is worth mentioning that one of the important areas of the Strategy is also the modification of the law enforcement system (prosecutor's office, investigative bodies) and the criminal justice system, as well as raising of the effectiveness of civil and administrative proceedings.

Referring to the Anti-Corruption Strategy, Kristinne Grigoryan emphasised the development of an institutional anti-corruption system and noted that the Strategy introduced the prevention, detection and investigation bodies, the guarantees of their activities and mechanisms for cooperation, mutual restraint and balance.

Speaking about the National Strategy for the Protection of Human Rights, the Deputy Minister attached importance to the fact that it provided the assessment of the human rights protection situation and touched upon the results of implementation of the previous strategies, as well as the problems in regard to the protection of the right to life of those under the State care and in life-threatening situations.

Summing up, Kristinne Grigoryan thanked the partners from the European Union for supporting the Ministry in the development of the Strategies and for providing important consultation and emphasised that the strategic planning and implementation process has been greatly facilitated by the format of the dialogue in the field of justice, which, as a platform for engagement of all the stakeholders in the field, including the NGOs, has definitely proven its efficiency.