Abortion is considered a violation of the right to life: The European Court of Human Rights has expressed such a stance in one of its precedential decisions. Advocate Miss Syuzanna Soghomonyan, Member of the AYLA Board said at the seminar on “Women’s Rights” organized for the advocates, lawyers and human rights activists in Gyumri City of Shirak Marz.
S. Soghomonyan introduced the women’s reproductive health rights and spoke about the legal issues in case of sex-selective abortions. The training is organized in the framework of “Influencing the Women’s Rights Agenda” project is implemented by the Armenian Young Lawyers Association NGO with financial support of the Embassy of the Federal Republic of Germany in the Republic of Armenia.
Currently as a result of sex selective abortions the balance between the number of boys and girls in Armenia is broken. Often the girls are not born because of the gender selection.
As we know, according to Article 10 of the RA Law on Reproductive Health and Reproductive Rights of Humans, that termination of pregnancy on the application of the woman is allowed till the 12th week of pregnancy; in case of the doctor’s instruction it is allowed till the 22nd week of pregnancy. Meanwhile, the government has developed a draft according to which up to the 22nd week of pregnancy, providing information about the gender of the child is prohibited. The draft also provides sanctions in case of violation of this requirement – fine in the amount of 250.000 AMD.
However Syuzanna Soghomonyan said the sanctions are quite mild and it s desirable to foresee prohibition to hold certain posts and positions for certain period.
The training participants rater actively discussed the theme. Anahit Stamboltsyan, President of “Legal Clinic” NGO of Gyumri said that in there is only one girl among the 20 children in her grandchild’s kindergarten group.
Advocate Mariam Zadoyan, the Project legal advisor spoke about the RA obligations under the International Treaties from the aspect of the protection of women’s rights and about the practical ways of application of the women’s rights.
Advocate Mariam Zadoyan, the Project Expert introduced information on women’s participation and introduced the international best practices. She spoke about legislative provisions of ensuring participation of women in legislative, executive and judicial powers, and local self government. She also spoke about the RA obligations under the International Treaties from the aspect of the protection of women’s rights and about the practical ways of application of the women’s rights.
