During its annual meeting, the UN General Assembly discussed the issues of protecting women and gender inequality in the framework of protection of human rights and fundamental freedoms.
As we have already informed, Michelle Bachelet, the head of the UN Women, stated that it was estimated that 8 in 10 women worldwide had limited or no access to their country’s formal justice system.
Ms. Bachelet also informed that in Australia, Canada, Israel, South Africa and the United States, between 40 and 70 percent of female murder victims were killed by their intimate partner. For example, in Guatemala, two women are murdered, on average, each day.
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In Armenia, there are also problems in this field, which are raised from different rostra and on different occasions. www.aravot.am inquired of Armen Martirosyan, the deputy leader of the Heritage Party, what Mr. Martirosyan thought formerly being an MP and communicating with different layers of the society what the situation regarding protection of women’s rights in Armenia was like. Mr. Martirosyan replied, “I think that the issue of protection of women’s rights in our country is almost the same as the issue of protection of
men’s rights. Women’s rights are protected insofar as the civil society is protected, regardless of its sex. It seems that there is no problem from the legal perspective, even the Constitution and the laws provide for gender equality. Therefore, I don’t see any need for revolutionary changes.”
Coming back to practice, Mr. Martirosyan stated, “In practice, there may be some incidents regarding gender differences particularly to the men’s disadvantage, since when employing someone, they request tall girls under thirty, on the other hand, they avoid employing some young girls, since there may be some problems with pregnancy.”
We inquired about the violence against women; in particular, recently the well-known scandal between the daughter-in-law and the mother-in-law had been much talked about. A. Martirosyan said in this regard, “Both parties are females in this case, so there are no gender problems here, that problem concerns an interpersonal relationship. Certainly, violence against women is more than against men given their physical abilities, but I don’t think that there are organized processes in our society or a clear tendency in terms of violence against women. They mainly concern the domestic life. In some case, women don’t apply to law-enforcers because of shame, but it gradually fades away. When the woman starts to be socially active, such problems become public in a short period of time and are solved.”
When asked to assess the level of women’s security in the Republic of Armenia on a five-point grading scale, Mr. Martirosyan stated that he would assess the situation ranging from 3 to 4.
We inquired what his definition of the modern woman was. Mr. Martirosyan replied that the modern Armenian woman was active and her activity was gradually increasing. Then he noted, “If they are a bit more active in business and politics, everything will be just fine.”
Being a father of two girls, A. Martirosyan also wishes that a really pleasant atmosphere appropriate for women is formed in Armenia.
Tatev HARUTYUNYAN
