Statement by Serzh Sargsyan on the results of his meeting with the Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjørn Jagland
Thank you, Distinguished Secretary General,
Ladies and gentlemen,
I am glad to get again hosted at the Council of Europe. I consider this visit of mine to be symbolic one since tomorrow, on January 25th, we will mark the 17th year of Armenia’s accession to the Council of Europe. The Armenia of 2018 was completely different from the Armenia of 2001: our country has registered significant achievements in the consolidation of democracy, human rights and rule of law, to which a substantial contribution was made through our long-standing and valuable cooperation with the Council of Europe. We thank you for the cooperation we enjoy.
As always, we had a noteworthy discussion with the Secretary General Jagland. I am glad to register that we shared close views on the numerous issues we discussed. We agreed that especially in the course of the past decade multifaceted reforms took place in Armenia for safeguarding fundamental freedoms, introducing more open and effective governance, developing a dynamic civil society. It was also recognized through the reports of the Charter-based and monitoring bodies of this organization. The primary recipient and beneficiary of this cooperation is the citizen of the Republic of Armenia: it is the point of departure for the proper implementation of the vision that we have undertaken vis-à-vis Council of Europe.
Now Armenia is smoothly undergoing through a transition towards the parliamentary form of governance. We are grateful to the Council of Europe for its valuable contribution to this process. Of course, we continue multifaceted legislative reform under the provisions of the amended Constitution in cooperation with the Venice Commission and independent monitoring committees of the Council of Europe.
We, of course, also discussed the issues connected with the settlement of the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict. I expressed our gratitude to Mr. Jagland for the support extended to the efforts of the OSCE Minsk Group Co-Chairs, which is important for the advancement of the negotiating process. I reiterated support to the views that Secretary General expressed on numerous occasions that there should be no “grey zones,” when it comes to the human rights protection in Europe. That means that the Council of Europe should also equally consider the rights of the citizens residing in the conflict areas being led by the “status-neutral” approach.
We agreed on the need to distinguish powers of the various international structures and “division of labour” between them. With this in mind we registered that the Council of Europe priority area should be the protection of human rights. As regards the resolution of the conflicts, that issue should be pursued by the powers of the internationally agreed and mandated structures and formats for a given conflict.
I am glad that despite all difficulties Mr. Jagland manages to effectively move forward the Council of Europe agenda and bolster the high prestige it enjoyed. We strongly believe that dialogue is the prerequisite on the path towards finding solutions for the challenges our organization is facing, and throughout that dialogue the voice of all member States should be heard without any discrimination in order to safeguard the integrity and unity of the Council of Europe.
I also reiterated the invitation I had extended to Mr. Jagland to visit Armenia in order to continue with our open and constructive dialogue, move forward our joint agenda, as well as to provide him with an opportunity to assess the results of the constitutional reform, to which, as I have already underlined, the Council of Europe made its specific contribution. Thank you.
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Statement by the Secretary General of the Council of Europe Thorbjørn Jagland on the results of his meeting with Serzh Sargsyan
Ladies and gentlemen
It is a great honor and pleasure to invite the President of Armenia Mr. Sargsyan here today.
As you know we have a very broad cooperation between Armenia and Council of Europe. We have seen that Armenia has got a new constitution, a new electoral code, elections have been held under new electoral code, all the reform processes are on and we have had a very thorough cooperation on all these things. I’m very glad that the President is coming to visit us in order to celebrate the 65th anniversary of the entering into force of the European Convention on Human Rights. We have had a very interesting exchange on many topics, but I would also mention before I give you the floor, Mr. President, I appreciate very much all the treaties that you signed today.
I have never been signing that many before, together with the head of state and with a foreign minister doing the work together with me. I have never seen so many conventions and treaties being signed at the same time. So, it tells a lot of the progress that Armenia has gone through. So, now I would like to give the floor to you.