On 21 August 2018, in the scope of the “Step towards Just Armenia” sub-grant project implemented in the scope of the “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project, a joint working discussion was held in the Vagharshapat Residency of the Armavir Marz Unit of the Probation Service with Artak Kirakosyan, the Director of the “Civil Society Institute” NGO, Yevgenia Ivanova, a responsible employee from the same NGO and a former member of the independent commission, marz head of unit Karen Stepanyan, chief specialists, and a group of volunteers.
During the working visit, the existing issues pertaining to early release were discussed and practical information was collected for an analysis. The Armavir Unit was selected because of being the biggest penitentiary in both Armenia and the region.
The “Commitment to Constructive Dialogue” project is implemented with the financial support of the European Union by a consortium of civil society organizations, which are the “Armenian Lawyers’ Association” NGO, Agora Central Europe o.p.s (an NGO from the Czech Republic), the “Armenian Center for Democratic Education-CIVITAS” NGO, the “International Center for Human Development” Public Organization, the “SME Cooperation Association” NGO and the Union of Communities of Armenia.
The overall objective of the project is to enhance the influence of CSOs and their coalitions (networks) on the public policy process. This will enable the organizations (that already work in target coalitions) to gain new resources, unite civil society experts and encourage them to participate in the formation of local and national policy agenda, identify the common problems and priorities and to apply to the government with constructive and strategic policy initiatives.
In the scope of the project, sub-grants will be allocated to CSOs and CSO coalitions, aiming at public policy development and achieving tangible results in the 9 target sectors: justice, human rights, public finance management, business, education, social sector: social inclusion of children with disabilities, agriculture, economy, energy.
