From left to right: Yeghiazar Avagyan, Deputy Prosecutor General of the Republic of Armenia, Grigor Elizbaryan, Stellv. Deputy Prosecutor General of the Republic of Armenia, Mane Markosyan, Advisor to the Prosecutor General of the Republic of Armenia (Copyright: Prosecutor General of the Republic of Armenia) Armenia
Article 3 of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) states that no one shall be subjected to torture or to inhuman or degrading treatment or punishment.
Prosecutors in the Armenian military who are responsible for ensuring the legality of investigations into violence against military personnel must also receive comprehensive training on the interpretation of this prohibition. The Republic of Armenia is also pursuing this goal in point 2.6 of the action plan of its National Strategy for the Protection of Human Rights.
On 27 September 2025, the Deputy Prosecutor General of the Republic of Armenia, Mr Yeghiazar Avagyan, the Military Prosecutor of the Republic of Armenia and the Deputy Prosecutor General of the Republic of Armenia, Mr Grigor Elizbaryan, discussed with German expert Mr Kristijan Vlasic, Public Prosecutor at the Düsseldorf Public Prosecutor's Office and Captain of the Reserve (Bundeswehr), and Dr Janna Liedtke, Judge at the Duisburg Labour Court, ways of promoting modern and international standards in the application of criminal law in Armenia.
At the request of the Armenian Attorney General's Office, training sessions and lectures were then held for military prosecutors, students at the military academy and other members of the public prosecutor's office. They received information on how to recognise different forms of torture and ill-treatment and how to investigate them effectively, taking into account legal, ethical and practical considerations. We would like to express our sincere thanks to the two speakers, Mr Grigor Elizbaryan and Mr Kristijan Vlasic, for their interesting presentations.
Participants of the seminar on domestic violence against children and young people. Armenia
Although Armenia signed the Istanbul Convention (Council of Europe Convention on Preventing and Combating Violence Against Women and Domestic Violence) in 2018, it has not yet ratified it and is therefore not bound by the obligations set out in the Convention.
Ratification has been delayed due to vehement opposition from the opposition and, in particular, the Armenian Apostolic Church, which criticises the convention for endangering national values and traditions and for promoting an inappropriate distribution of gender roles. Nevertheless, in April 2024, parliament modernised the law on the prevention of domestic violence and the protection of its victims, introduced criminal prosecution for domestic violence and broadened the definition of ‘partner’ to protect LGBT+ persons.
The Office of the Human Rights Defender of the Republic of Armenia, established in 2004, monitors the implementation of the provisions of the UN Convention on the Rights of the Child of 20 November 1989 and the prevention of and protection against violations of children's rights under the current Human Rights Defender, Ms Anahit Manasyan. In order to strengthen the capacity of the office's own staff to identify, prevent and respond to violence against children, IRZ and its partner organisation held a seminar on domestic violence against children and young people in Yerevan on 11 and 12 June 2025.
The discussions focused primarily on a conviction by the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) in Strasbourg in 2024 concerning the rape of a vulnerable minor in Armenia. The two German speakers discussed with the participants the violations of the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) by Armenia identified by the ECtHR, but also the ECtHR's judgments relating to German court practice, in particular how the shortcomings identified by the ECtHR are dealt with in practice in Germany.
Further measures to promote compliance with, implementation and strengthening of human rights and the rule of law will follow. The current event is therefore only the beginning of comprehensive consultations on domestic violence with a view to increasing acceptance for the ratification of the Istanbul Convention.
In February, the practically relevant topic of the absorption of illegally acquired assets was addressed together with the IRZ's new partner organisation, the Anti-Corruption Chamber at the Court of Cassation. In the presence of the Head of the Anti-Corruption Chamber, Mr Artur Davtyan, 30 judges from the Anti-Corruption Chamber, the Anti-Corruption Court and the Anti-Corruption Appeal Court took part in the training. After an introductory presentation by the Armenian judge Lisa Grigoryan on the fight against corruption and the freezing of assets in Armenia, the German IRZ expert, Senior Public Prosecutor Kathrin Brockhöft from the Central Office for Organised Crime and Corruption at the General Prosecutors Office in Celle, took over the further management of the training. Many procedural challenges were discussed and solutions were developed in lively question and answer sessions and discussion rounds.
On the following day, the IRZ organised a lecture on the same topic together with the Faculty of Law at Yerevan State University. After the opening speech by the Dean of the Law Faculty, Harutjun Khachikyan, and an introductory lecture by Gevorg Barseghyan, a lecturer at the Chair of Criminal Law, Senior Public Prosecutor Kathrin Brockhöft also continued the lecture and the subsequent discussion. Around 40 students from various universities and educational institutions in Yerevan took part in the lecture on the confiscation of assets of illicit origin with obvious interest.
