Armenian young lawyers association informs that the first session of the Anti-Corruption Council will be held on 28 July.
Notably, the activities of this body, created by the government, were boycotted by Non-governmental organizations, i.e. the Anti-Corruption Coalition of the Civil Society Organizations, and also 4 oppositional parties of NA. The members of the Council are the Prime-Minister, General Prosecutor, Minister of Finances and others.
The agenda of the first session clearly shows that these questions do not bother the members at all, instead, questions of secondary nature are set to be discussed during the session.
Marat Atovmyan, lawyer and representative of Anti-Corruption Coalition of the Civil Society, told Iravaban.net that the agenda of the first session of the Anti-Corruption Council is quite saturated; 10 questions are involved, a number of questions refer to the verification of some documents concerning the Council: “There are several questions which are not very urgent, such as representation of the situation the sphere of Information freedom, discussion of existing problems, discussing problems concerning the creation of Public Councils adjacent the Ministers, and so on. I do not say these are not important questions, but not for being included in the first session” – said Mr. Atovmyan.
According to him, much more important question must have been included in the first session: “To my mind it would have been more proper, that the council of the first session was bothered with the question that the Council is not formulated thoroughly: there are no NGOs, 4 oppositional parties of NA boycotted the Council. These are the questions to be discussed firstly; NGOs representing Anti-Corruption Coalition would have been invited, and the reason why NGOs did not want to be the Council members. Besides, a number of organizations were constantly bringing up the question of the creation of multi-faceted professional working group, hat would discuss two questions: problems concerning institutional system and illegal enrichment”- said our interlocutor. According to him the Council must have considered these questions primary.
What concerns questions of secondary nature, the agenda shows that 2 reports are to be made by 2 heads of NGOs which are not Council members: “It is not clear at all, by what logics these questions and their reporters were chosen, and from juridical point of view we see, that point 15 of the order set by RA Government on creating the Council and Expert Committee of 19 February 2015 claims that representatives of NGOs and Mass Media and other persons may take part in the session by the invitation of the Council. But here it is not mentioned that they have a right to make reports”- said Marat Atovmyan.
It turns that the Government could not include Non-governmental organization in the staff of the Council, and tries to “show” that civil society’s membership in the session of the Council is provided.
