A REPORT ABOUT THE SITUATION OF THE WOMEN

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[06:50 pm] 17 April, 2006

Today in the RA Parliament Mrs. Vera Oskina, the reporter of the
PACE Committee of the equality of rights between men and women,
and Mrs. Zhanik Devo, worker of the PACE secretariat, were received
by Tigran Torosyan, the head of the RA delegation to PACE and NA
Deputy Speaker.

Mr. Oskina mentioned that she is preparing a report about the situation
of the women in Armenia, Georgia and Azerbaijan. She was interested
in the role of the women in the political life of Armenia, their
involvement in the local governing bodies, the issues of trafficking
and family violence in Armenia and the statistics in these fields.

Mr. Torosyan mentioned that trafficking and family violence contradict
to the Armenian traditions and form a negligible percent. Referring
to the involvement of the women in the political events he mentioned
that the Armenian women prefer to be engaged in social activities
than political, as 99% of the heads of NGOs are women.

As for the fact that 25% of the electoral rolls is allotted to women,
according to Mr. Torosyan, “positive” discrimination is not good
either and we must not contribute to the involvement of women with
unnatural steps.

During the meeting other issues of mutual interest were discussed too.