The regular sitting of the Council on Women’s Affairs of the Republic of Armenia took place today, on 19 March, in a remote format.
The meeting was attended by representatives of the ministries and other departments included in the council, representatives of organizations, CSOs, including the representative of the Armenian Lawyers’ Association, Lawyer Mariam Zadoyan, and member of the organization, Lawyer Vardanush Kavalyan.
Ms Tatevik Stepanyan, the First Deputy Minister of Labor and Social Affairs, presented the summary of the measures implemented in 2020 under the “Gender Policy Implementation Strategy and Action Plan 2019–2023 in the RA”. Let us remind that the priorities of the gender strategy are:
- Improving the national mechanism for the advancement of women, equal participation of women and men in governance and decision-making;
- Overcoming gender discrimination in the socio-economic sphere, expanding women’s economic opportunities;
- Full and effective participation of women and men and expansion of equal opportunities in education and science;
- Enhancing equal opportunities for women and men in Healthcare secror;
- Prevention of gender discrimination.
Ms Victoria Poghosyan, the RA Deputy Minister of High Technological Industry presented the measures and proposals promoting the involvement of women in the sphere of information technologies.
Mr. Vache Terteryan, Deputy Minister of Territorial Administration and Infrastructure, presented the steps to be taken to increase the role of women at the decision-making level in the regions and communities, as well as the work of the standing committees dealing with gender issues in the regional administrations and the Yerevan Municipality. The proposals aimed at activating their activities were also discussed.
Ms Vardanush Kavalyan, Lawyer, a member of the “Armenian Lawyers; Association” NGO, spoke about the issue of targeting a new vulnerable group, referring to women displaced from Artsakh during the 2020 war and the women in Armenia who lost relatives during the war.
During the session, sectoral issues related to women’s issues were identified, and proposals were made, including on cases of domestic violence; promoting women’s economic activity, and etc.