Conference devoted to the new draft Penitentiary Code held with co-ordination of the Ministry of Justice and the National Assembly

A conference devoted to the new draft Penitentiary Code was held with participation of representatives of the executive, legislative and judicial powers, as well as the Prosecutors Office, the Chamber of Advocates and the Human Rights' Defenders Office.

The discussion was specifically important in the sense that starting from 1 July 2022 the new Criminal, Criminal Procedure and Penitentiary Codes are envisaged to concurrently be executed.

Within the framework of the conference, Deputy Minister of Justice Arpine Sargsyan emphasised that the new Code is based on the principles of individualised sentence for the convicts, as well as she attached importance to the fact of actually having the adopted ideology in place in the law-enforcement practice starting from 1 July.

Chairperson of the Standing Committee on State and Legal Affairs of the National Assembly Vladimir Vardanyan welcomed the selected format of the conference and emphasised the importance of the fight against criminal subculture from the point of view of ensuring zero tolerance towards criminal subculture both within the penitentiary institutions and among in general public, and extirpating it.

At the end of the session, an agreement was reached to jointly review all the comments made on the new draft Penitentiary Code, which will help improving the Code.

The meeting was held with the support of the Standing Committee on State and Legal Affairs of the National Assembly within the framework of the UNDP's "Modern Parliament for a Modern Armenia" Project.