4th Meeting of EU-Armenia Strategic Justice Policy Dialogue held — Reforms being implemented in judicial-legal sector and anti-corruption field and indicators of EU budget support programme presented

17/07/2024

Deputy Minister of Justice Karen Karapetyan delivered his opening remarks at the 4th Meeting of the EU-Armenia Strategic Policy Dialogue, emphasising the commitment of the Government to close and fruitful co-operation with the European Union within the scope of sector-specific reforms in line with the European best standards.

The Deputy Minister mentioned that, in this context, the EU-Armenia Strategic Policy Dialogue serves as a key platform, providing an opportunity to state the progress achieved in the sector, the existing impediments, as well as to predetermine the future actions.

Ambassador of the Delegation of the European Union to Armenia Vassilis Maragos attached importance to the efforts of the Ministry of Justice aimed at securing the indicators of the EU budget support programme and the sustainable co-operation between the two institutions within the scope of the Armenia-EU Comprehensive and Enhanced Partnership Agreement.

The Deputy Minister presented the achievements and progress of the 2022-2026 Strategy for Judicial and Legal Reforms and the Action Plan, as well as the planned activities, touching upon the e-justice tools, performance evaluation of judges, the current mechanisms for integrity checks for judges, prosecutors and investigators and reforms in the criminal justice sector.

Karen Karapetyan also spoke about the activities aimed at reducing the workload of courts, attaching importance to the establishment of the institution of mediation with the view to developing alternative mechanisms for settlement of disputes and the ongoing initiatives for the qualification and training of mediators. The Deputy Minister also touched upon the activities that the Ministry of Justice is carrying out within the scope of the National Strategy for Human Rights Protection.

The participants of the meeting discussed the issues of interest within the scope of judicial-legal and anti-corruption reforms, touching upon the progress of implementation of the Strategies, the election of members of the Corruption Prevention Commission, the possibility of publishing opinion on the integrity of officials, the amendments to be made to the Judicial Code, etc.

Karen Karapetyan also presented the achievements made in the first semester of 2024 for implementation of the Action Plan of the 2023-2026 Anti-Corruption Strategy as he spoke about strengthening of the corruption prevention and integrity systems, as well as training and awareness-raising activities in the anti-corruption field.

At the end of the meeting, the EU colleagues reaffirmed their commitment to providing continued support to the Government of Armenia and to the Ministry of Justice for implementation of the sector-specific reforms in line with the European best standards.

Head of the Delegation of the European Union to Armenia, Ambassador Vassilis Maragos; Head of European Commission Directorate General for Neighbourhood and Enlargement Negotiations David Cullen; Acting Head of European Commission Directorate General for Justice and Consumers Louisa Klingvall, as well as Deputy Minister of Foreign Affairs Paruyr Hovhannisyan also delivered speeches at the meeting.