On March 5, Armenia’s Human Rights Defender Anahit Manasyan met with the Secretary General of the Council of Europe, Marija Pejčinović Burić, within the framework of her working visit to Strasbourg.
The Defender presented issues related to the protection of the rights of people forcibly displaced from Nagorno-Karabakh, referred to the fact-finding activities carried out by her personally and by her staff, during which information was obtained about death, torture, disrespect of bodies, mutilation and ill-treatment of civilians, prohibited by international law. The mentioned information was included in the ad hoc report of the Human Rights Defender, which was presented by the Defender to the international organizations and actors with the mandate of human rights protection, with the confidential section proving the authenticity of the information.
Anahit Manasyan also referred to the protection of women’s rights, the prevention of domestic violence, the need to ratify the Istanbul Convention, the details of the implementation of the human rights protection program in the field of biomedicine, including the issue of ratifying the Oviedo Convention by Armenia.
The Defender presented the activities carried out in the fields of discrimination, intolerance, fight against hate speech, the right to freedom of assembly and in a number of other areas.
At the end of the meeting, the parties highly appreciated the level of long-term and effective cooperation between the Defender’s Office and the Council of Europe in the field of human rights protection and outlined directions for expanding cooperation.
