Epress.am News from Armenia
Community rehabilitation centers working with youth in trouble with the law and law enforcement officials are no longer operating since January 2014, as international funding wrapped up, while establishing a probation service in Armenia is being delayed.
RA Deputy Minister of Justice Aram Orbelyan, Executive Director of the Fund for Armenian Relief Children's Center Mira Antonyan, and RA Police Deputy Chief of the 3rd administration Artur Vardanyan discussed this topic with members of the media earlier today in Yerevan. They did not rule out the possibility that because of the current situation, the level of crime among minors could increase.
"According to the police, in 2011, 453 minors broke the law and were prosecuted; in 2012, this number was 349; and in 2013, 352.
"In 2011, 8; in 2012, 0; and in 2013, 2 minors who were previously convicted committed crimes. The rehabilitation centers worked with 1,000 minors, which resulted in positive outcomes," said Vardanyan.
The US and the Child Development Foundation, according to the speakers, stopped funding the rehabilitation centers, after which police officers and NGO workers joined together to work with the youth on a volunteer basis.
"Over these past 7 years, hundreds of minors were directed to the centers, where serious work was undertaken. Documenting positive results from this work, the police is making attempts to organize meetings with interested parties, so the work can continue," said the police representative.
Mira Antonyan remarked that from the perspective of cost-effectiveness it's better to offer daytime programs to the youth; however, the problem of funding such centers will come up from time to time. "For a poor country, it's a huge luxury to establish comprehensive services for every problem, and it would be right for the police and the justice ministry to find the format where it will be possible to work on both this and that problem," she said.
According to her, they worked with not only registered youth, but also those who weren't yet considered subject to registration. "We worked with the children's inner world and changed their perception of the world," said Antonyan.
Aram Orbelyan, the justice ministry representative, assured that his ministry always thought positively about the activities of the rehabilitation centers.
"If a budgetary claim is presented, perhaps it will be possible to continue the work of these centers. Continuing the centers' activities on account of the Police or the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs budgets is currently being discussed. It's possible that some communities continue funding on account of their [own] budgets, and these centers [will] continue to operate. We've discussed as well the matter of funding the centers' work through extra-budgetary means, but there's still no clear answer about the fate of such means," Orbelyan concluded.