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On November 3, at the joint sitting of the Committees on Protection of Human Rights and on Financial-Credit and Budgetary Affairs the debates on the RA State Budget for 2022 continued.

The RA Minister of Finance Tigran Khachatryan informed that 542mln 700.000 AMD would be allocated to the Staff of the Human Rights Defender (HRD) against the allocated 532mln 500.000 AMD. The growth is 1.92%. The HRD Staff will implement one programme, where three events are included.

The Chair of the Standing Committee on Protection of Human Rights and Public Affairs Taguhi Tovmasyan noted that during the last years the number of the citizens applying to the HRD had abruptly grown. “I would like to understand why the growth of the allocations by the HRD Staff were in that amount,” the MP was interested in this context.

The Minister of Finance clarified, noting: “In case of the HRD Staff, in all other institutions the final financial indices included in the draft budget reflect the financial picture of the legal acts. At the stage of debating, summing up the draft state budget the Ministry of Finance is not authorized to debate that how many positions the state government body should have or what office degrees should present those positions. We only check and reflect the financial indices prescribed by legal acts corresponding to the decisions.”

The HRD Arman Tatoyan touched upon the works done by the Office, highlighted the effective cooperation formed with the parliamentary Committee. He has noted that the Office works overloaded: beginning from 2014 the number of the citizens applying to the HRD Office. If about 5200 citizens applied to the Office, then during the same period of 2020 the number of the application-complaints reached 11.598, and in 2021 – 16.000. The citizens complained in written form and calling to the quick response team. According to Arman Tatoyan, in the last year the priorities of the Office activity were also changed. Arman Tatoyan especially considered the protection of the servicemen, including the conscripts, related to that distinct proposals were presented to the parliamentary Head Committees. The HRD deemed necessary to regulate the issue of providing houses to the servicemen and all others equalized to them, adding that in relation to these proposals were also presented. “We proposed to give an opportunity to make use of the long-term mortgage loan state purposeful programmes to the employees of the National Security and the penitentiary services and the police,” he said. The HRD emphasized the solution of the problems of the persons with disabilities and other issues.

Arman Tatoyan answered to other questions.