Epress.am News from Armenia
The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) decided to fast-track the appeal of four retired Armenian judges — Tariel Manukyan, Lyova Gabrielyan, Frunze Dzvakeryan, and Misha Asatryan, the judges' representative Ara Ghazaryan informed Epress.am. The judges are appealing an Oct. 5, 2010 decision which introduced a new system of calculating judges' pensions that sets a lower pension and is applied retroactively.
Acoording to Ghazaryan, the ECHR fast tracks cases that it considers contain serious human rights violations. According to the ECHR official website, the Court amended its case processing policy in June 2009, whereby it now regards the importance and urgency of the issues raised in deciding the order in which cases are to be dealt with, taking into consideration various factors.
"Such laws have been adopted extensively since 2006, violating the rights of various groups — the rights of both current and retired judges. A trend can now be seen. For example, a famous case: Judge Suren Ghazaryan resigned due to health problems, knowing that he will receive a [monthly] pension of 600,000 dram [about $1,481 USD], but now he receives a pension of 0 dram, since a new law was adopted and applied to him retroactively. With such laws there is an attempt to fill the state budget, violating people’s rights. [This] administration consistently issues a blow to one of the weakest points of the independence of the judicial system — the social independence of the judge," said the attorney.
According to Ghazaryan, such laws, which might have adverse effects on citizens, shouldn't be applied retroactively.
The judges who appealed to the ECHR won their case in Armenia's Administrative Court, but the ruling was reversed.
The Chamber of Advocates of Armenia also expressed its concern [AM] with the draft laws presented by the government to parliament On Making Amendments to the Judicial Code of Armenia and On the Remuneration of Persons Holding Public Office.