The Head of the RA Special Investigation Service Sasun Khachatryan, the Deputy Head Vladimir Hovhannisyan, and the Head of the Department for the Investigation of Torture and Crimes against Humanity of the Service met with experts Mushegh Ekmalyan and Yannis Sofianopoulos who are in Armenia in the framework of the monitoring mission to evaluate the performance of actions of EU Budget Support Program on the “Support to Human Rights Protection in Armenia”

We learn about this from the press release of the Special Investigation Service.

During the meeting, the experts were introduced to the peculiarities of the investigation of crimes against humanity and statistics on criminal cases investigated in the service in cases of torture. They also referred to the course of the mentioned criminal cases, including some obstacles encountered during the preliminary investigation stage.

Thanking the Head of the Service for organizing the meeting and the warm reception, the experts presented the main target areas of their program, which are: support for human rights and gender equality. They noted that the actions outlined in the program are carried out in two stages, the first of which is the monitoring to assess the implementation of the agreement, and the second is the presentation of a proposal for a new program to be implemented in Armenia, the policy of which is currently being negotiated. At the same time, the experts said that in the second stage of the operation it is planned to establish a new platform for Armenia-EU cooperation, within the framework of which a needs assessment process is envisaged.

During the meeting, the need to videotape the investigative actions carried out within the framework of the investigation of criminal cases initiated by the police, investigation bodies, which, according to the parties, will contribute to the detection of cases of torture, ill-treatment and increase the effectiveness of the investigation.