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On October 26 the National Assembly began the work of the four-day sittings.

At the beginning of the sitting by the proposal of the NA Speaker Galust Sahakyan, the deputies welcomed the lecturers and the students of Gyumri Mikael Nalbandian State Pedagogical Institute, who visited the parliament within the framework of the NA “Open Doors” programme and were observing the sitting.

The deputies by voting passed the draft law “On Amending the RA Law on Guaranteeing the Physical Entities’ Bank Deposits” authored by Mikael Melkumyan, Naira Zohrabyan, Elinar Vardanyan.

The NA Speaker Galust Sahakyan introduced the draft laws of the agendas of the session, then the four-day sittings, after the approval of which the deputies continued debating the report “On the Activities of the RA Human Rights Defender and the Violation of Rights and Fundamental Freedoms in the Country during 2004,” which submitted the RA Human Rights Defender (HRD) Karen Andreasyan.

The deputies addressed various questions to the RA HRD, which mainly related to the protection of children’s, young people’s and voters’ rights, human rights and the development of the mechanisms of their protection, the differences of the education quality in general and private schools.

The Chair of the NA Standing Committee on Protection of Human Rights and Public Affairs Elinar Vardanyan has noted that in the report the violations recorded in 2014 if not completely, then mostly repeat the violations recorded in 2013. Speaking about the cases of violations of human rights as a result of legislative gaps, the Committee Chair touched upon the interpretation of the laws in the same way and the problem of their application.

The NA deputies Tigran Urikhanyan, Tevan Poghosyan, Aram Manukyan, Heghine Bisharyan, Levon Zurabyan, Vahram Mkrtchyan, Margarit Yesayan, Stepan Demirchyan, Ruzanna Muradyan, Hovhannes Margaryan, Edmon Marukyan and Ishkhan Khachatryan expressed their viewpoints on the report.

In their speeches the NA deputies also touched upon a number of problems, which related to the decisions of the European Court of Human Rights, the statistics of the violations of human rights in the marzes, providing funeral allowances to the retired and housing to the citizens. The MPs considered necessary the pedagogues’ training, touched upon the shortcomings existing at schools and social problems in the country.

The NA Deputy Speaker Eduard Sharmazanov delivered an extraordinary speech, qualifying unprecedented the creation of the HRD’s Institute in our country. Mr Sharmazanov has underlined that the Ombudsman’s problem is to criticize and disclose and to indicate the ways of their solution, but not to hide them. Positively assessing the activities of the HRD’s Office, he has noted that the Ombudsman’s Institute has been established due to the work of the former heads and incumbent one, as well as the HRD Staff.

The NA deputies will continue giving speeches on the report “On the Violation of the Activities of the RA Human Rights Defender and the Violation of Rights and Fundamental Freedoms during 2004” at October 27 NA sitting.