Start date: 1 January 2023

Duration: 24 months

Budget: EUR 550,000

Donor: The Council of Europe Action Plan for Armenia 2023-2026

Partners: Ministry of Justice of the Republic of Armenia, Penitentiary Service, Prison Medicine Centre, Ministry of Health

Contact person: Ms Diana Ghazaryan, Senior Project Officer

Building upon the results achieved from the implementation of the Council of Europe Project “Enhancing healthcare and human rights protection in prisons in Armenia” (hereinafter, 2019-2022 project), the Action “Strengthening the Protection of the Rights of Persons in Detention” assists the Armenian authorities to further enhance penitentiary reform and prison health care, and the protection of the human rights of persons deprived of liberty. Council of Europe is providing support at policy and operational level assisting authorities to accomplish penitentiary reform goals and trigger changes in practices throughout the prison system especially after the adoption of the Criminal Code, Criminal Procedural Code as well as Penitentiary Code in June 2022.

The Action focuses on following priority areas:

• Further enhancing the institutional capacity of the ‘’Prison Medicine Centre’’ State Non-Commercial Organisation in order to provide quality health care in the penitentiary system
• Further consolidating the knowledge and skills of medical and non-medical staff on different topics on provision of health care
• Developing and piloting preventive health care programmes in penitentiary facilities
• Strengthening the capacities of prison staff to apply tools and rehabilitation programmes for persons deprived of liberty
• Harmonizing the regulatory framework on human rights with the new Penitentiary Code

The Action is implemented in close cooperation with the Ministry of Justice, Ministry of Health, ‘’Prison Medicine Centre’’ State Non-Commercial Organisation of Armenia and includes a wide spectrum of other domestic stakeholders and civil society organizations.

The key Conventions for this Action are the European Convention for the Prevention of Torture and Inhuman or Degrading Treatment or Punishment and the European Convention for the Protection of Human Rights and Fundamental Freedoms (ECHR), as well as the findings and the recommendations of the European Committee for the Prevention of Torture (CPT) and the judgments of the European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR).