During the recent session of the National Assembly Human Rights and Public Affairs Committee, Prosperous Armenia deputy Sergey Bagratyan raised the question of whether the 2020 Armenian state budget has allocated money for the defense of Armenian citizens abroad. Naira Zohrabyan added that she had recently received a letter from an Armenian refugee in Germany who is in the final stages of cancer. The woman said that she is even being denied the right to stay in a hospital and she wanted to know if the Armenian state can help this woman who has the status of a refugee.
Human Rights Defender of Armenia Arman Tatoyan said, “I spoke to the human rights defender of Russia regarding the Khachaturyan sisters. We agreed that we would study the case together and we would send our observations to our colleagues in Russia to publicly state the worries of Armenian activists.” Regarding Armenian citizens living abroad, Tatoyan said that he receives many complaints, but the Human Rights Defender’s office does not have authority outside of Armenia. So, the office tries to use its connections to keep citizens informed about the laws and to help them in any way they can.
Naira Zohrabyan also said that the situation of Armenians who have been killed by Azeris is also problematic. “Azeris hire hitmen to kill Armenians in Russian prisons. I have information about this. Azeri typhoons are severely torturing five Armenian citizens in Russian prisons. We should at least demand extradition in extreme cases, but the Ministry of Justice has refused to work on that, stating that it does not want to set a precedent because then all Armenians in Russian prisons will want to serve their sentences in Armenia since their conditions are worse there.”
Arman Tatoyan responded that he is working on several cases with his Russian colleagues.
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