On January 16, the Armenian Lawyers’ Association held its regular Board Meeting. Chairperson of the meeting, Mr. Karen Zadoyan, President of the Association, who chaired the meeting, presented to the board members the works done in 2017 in a number of targeted areas. Specifically, significant improvements have been made in anti-corruption field with the efforts of the ALA: During the past year the provisions on identification of the beneficial owners of the companies in the public procurement sphere, the provision of the criminalization of illicit enrichment, limitation on making cash transactions by high-ranking officials, the law on the system of whistleblowers and other came into legal force.
It is noteworthy that in 2017 BizProtect.am website through which the Institute of Whistleblowers begun to operate was launched. Representatives of the business sector obtained an opportunity to report anonymously about problems and corruption risks that they encountered. There are already some success stories when the problems were solved after the report of the businessmen.
The capacity building of civil society organizations (CSOs) is ALA’s target area as well. At present, the CSOs’ consortium led by the ALA is implementing the EU funded “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project which have the objective to increase the effectiveness of CSOs in the developing of evidence based public policies.
One of the agenda issues of the Board meeting was the issue of coordinating the key areas of activities envisaged by the Charter of the ALA and the appointment of responsible persons from the Board.
The Board discussed and approved the Strategic Plan of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association for 2018-2021.
One of the agenda issues was the issue of appointing the Editor-in-Chief of Iravaban.net independent professional news website operated by the ALA. The ALA Board appointed Astghik Karapetyan Editor-in-Chief.
It is known that, according to the Law on Non-Governmental Organizations, NGOs should review their statutes and harmonize them with the provisions of law. The ALA Board also decided to convene a General Meeting on February 2 and discuss the issue of implementing changes to the ALA Statute.
Other issues were discussed during the meeting as well.
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