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FORUM 18 NEWS SERVICE, Oslo, Norway
http://www.forum18.org/
The right to believe, to worship and witness
The right to change one's belief or religion
The right to join together and express one's belief
===============================================
Thursday 14 July 2011
ARMENIA: "A KIND OF THEATRICAL FARCE - I SEE NO PROGRESS"
Human rights defenders and some religious communities have expressed
concern over provisions of a proposed new Religion Law and amendments to
the Law on the State and the Armenian Church, and to the Criminal and
Administrative Codes. They told Forum 18 News Service of their concerns
over: the ban on "soul-hunting", defined as "improper proselytism", which
could be punished by up to two months' imprisonment (up to two years' if
done by more than one person); compulsory religious registration for
communities of more than 25 adults; and vague formulations which some
religious communities fear could be used against them. The Justice Ministry
published the drafts on 12 July. "These proposed amendments are repressive
and a lot worse than the previous version," Stepan Danielyan of the
Collaboration for Democracy Centre told Forum 18. But Russian Orthodox
priest Fr Arseni Grigoryants welcomed the drafts' "harsh attitude to
incidents of proselytism" and "attempts to provide [juridical] mechanisms"
to punish them.
ARMENIA: "A KIND OF THEATRICAL FARCE - I SEE NO PROGRESS"
By Felix Corley, Forum 18 News Service
Human rights defenders and members of some religious minorities have
reacted critically to drafts of a proposed new Religion Law, as well as
changes to the Law on Relations between the Republic of Armenia and the
Armenian Apostolic Church, and to the Criminal and Administrative Codes.
The draft laws were made public on 12 July. "These proposed amendments are
repressive and a lot worse than the previous version," Stepan Danielyan of
the Collaboration for Democracy Centre told Forum 18 News Service from the
Armenian capital Yerevan on 13 July. "In practice they would be used to
repress religious organisations." Evangelical Pastor René Leonian is
equally critical of the drafts and the government's approach. "This is a
kind of theatrical farce," he told Forum 18 from Yerevan the same day. "I
see no progress."
The major proposals Armenian religious communities and human rights
defenders have so far expressed concern about include: proposed punishments
for sharing one's faith; compulsory registration for any religious
community with more than 25 members, with punishments for those who do not
register; as well as the vague formulation of many provisions. All of these
are thought likely to leave followers of religious organisations the
government - or the powerful Armenian Apostolic Church - dislikes
vulnerable to arbitrary and tight restrictions on their freedom of religion
or belief.
Why is Justice Ministry hostile to public discussion?
The Justice Ministry prepared the draft Amendments, and intended to send
them to the Council of Europe's Venice Commission without public discussion
- even though Justice Minister Hrair Tovmasyan had publicly promised that
they would be publicly discussed before being sent to the Venice Commission
(see F18News 24 February 2011
).
Karen Hakopyan, Head of the Department of Normative Acts at the Justice
Ministry, told Forum 18 on 6 July categorically that the draft texts would
not be made public and would be sent to the Council of Europe's Venice
Commission without any public discussion. Similarly, Nora Sargsyan, an aide
to Minister Tovmasyan who played a key role in preparing the new drafts,
insisted to Forum 18 from Yerevan on 9 July (before the drafts were
published) that the texts were not being made public and were being
translated into English to be sent only to the Venice Commission.
This is the same highly controversial procedure that was followed for the
previous proposed amendments, which only became known in Armenia when they
were placed - in English only - on the Venice Commission website (see
F18News 8 December 2010
).
Hakopyan of the Justice Ministry, as well as another senior official
involved in the process in the central government apparatus (who asked not
to be identified because they are not authorised to talk to the media),
told Forum 18 on 6 July that the Justice Ministry sent the draft texts to
the central government apparatus on 29 June.
The senior government official told Forum 18 that the government's
religious affairs official Vardan Astsatryan of the Department for Ethnic
Minorities and Religious Affairs was preparing an opinion on the drafts and
that the government has not yet approved them. Astsatryan's telephone went
unanswered each time Forum 18 called between 6 and 14 July.
However, by 11 July the Justice Ministry had changed its position and
posted the texts on its website on 12 July. "The draft text will be
published so that we can receive comments from the public," Deputy Justice
Minister Emil Babayan told Forum 18 the day before they were made public.
However, the Justice Ministry website posted the texts without any comment
or invitation for comments from the public. Babayan insisted that comments
would be sought from the Venice Commission at the same time as comments
from interested parties within Armenia. "The Venice Commission is one of
those parties. This is a simultaneous, twin-track process. All comments
will be taken into account."
Justice Minister keeping his promises?
Following strong criticism of earlier drafts, including severe criticisms
made of them and the existing Religion Law by a December 2010 joint Council
of Europe Venice Commission / Organisation for Security and Co-operation in
Europe (OSCE) legal review, Justice Minister Tovmasyan on 17 February 2011
promised that the proposals would be re-drafted to take account of the
criticisms. Before a large audience of civil society activists, religious
communities, local journalists and Venice Commission member Finola
Flanagan, Tovmasyan specifically highlighted for the re-draft the need to:
- avoid defining proselytism or soul-hunting, as this may attack the right
to share beliefs, but defining precisely what actions are prohibited;
- on the right to legal personality that unregistered religious activity
should be permitted, that high minimum numbers of members to register a
community should be avoided;
- that the actions of some members should not be a reason to liquidate
entire communities, and that liquidation should be a final resort after
other warnings and penalties have been exhausted;
- and that the state must respect the rights of parents to decide on the
education of children in line with their own religion or beliefs (see
F18News 24 February 2011
).
However, the latest July proposals appear to have largely ignored
Tovmasyan's public commitments. It also appears, as the Venice Commission
itself noted in its December 2010 Opinion, that "the drafters in many
instances do not appear to have taken into account the recommendations in
the 2009 Joint Opinion" - or the 2010 Opinion (see F18News 20 January 2011
).
The 2009 Joint Opinion was highly critical of an earlier restrictive set of
Religion Law amendments, which Parliament passed on first reading in March
2009 (see F18News 2 July 2009
). Although these
proposed amendments appear to have stalled, Parliament could still revive
them.
On 14 July Forum 18 asked the Justice Ministry press office in writing to
ask Minister Tovmasyan why the specific commitments on the content appear
largely not to have been met and why the promise to hold a public
consultation within Armenia before the texts were sent to the Venice
Commission appears to have been abandoned. Forum 18 had received no reply
by the end of the working day.
"Brought into line with Armenia's Constitution and with OSCE standards"
Human rights defenders and religious communities insist that the latest
amendments restrict the right to religious freedom. But despite this, Nora
Sargsyan, Minister Tovmasyan's aide who played a key role in preparing the
new drafts, claimed to Forum 18 that the amendments have been "brought into
line with Armenia's Constitution and with OSCE standards". Despite her
confidence in this, she would not on 9 July give Forum 18 a copy of the
drafts and said at that time that they would not be made public.
On 14 July, after the drafts were made public contrary to Sargsyan's
earlier assurances, she declined to discuss any of the provisions with
Forum 18.
Several informed sources have strongly suggested to Forum 18 that the
Armenian Apostolic Church has been closely involved in the repeated
restrictive drafts, even to the extent of drafting texts for them. Sargsyan
insisted though that the Apostolic Church (which has its headquarters at
Echmiadzin near Yerevan) had nothing to do with preparing the drafts.
"Echmiadzin is not responsible for legislative policy in Armenia," she told
Forum 18. "Echmiadzin may be part of public discussion like anyone else."
What is in the new proposals?
The latest published amendments are a proposed new Religion Law, as well as
changes to the Law on Relations between the State and the Armenian
Apostolic Church, and to the Criminal and Administrative Codes. The new
proposed Religion Law would entirely replace the current Religion Law first
adopted in 1991 and amended several times since, notably in 1997 and 2001.
The main proposals that so far most concern Armenian human rights defenders
and religious communities are outlined below. As discussion continues in
Armenia (see below), further concerns may be raised.
- Freedom of religion or belief dangerous?
Many provisions of the proposed new Religion Law give the impression that
allowing freedom of religion or belief is potentially dangerous, and that
religious communities must be subject to special scrutiny. Religious
communities are banned from functioning "in secret", using "preaching
influence on persons holding other religious affiliation or views which is
not compatible with respect for freedom of conscience, religion or belief",
or controlling the "private life, health, property and behaviour" of
adherents. They are required to act in accordance with Armenia's
Constitution and Laws and respect others' religious or theological
affiliation.
- Children's rights
Preaching to children under 14 without their parents' consent is banned and
punishable. Forum 18 is not aware that any faiths in Armenia engage in this
practice with the exception of the Armenian Apostolic Church, whose priests
sometimes address children in schools without their parents' express
consent.
- "Soul-hunting"
Crucially, "soul-hunting" is banned and punishable under amendments to both
the Criminal and Administrative Codes. Defined on first mention in Article
4 of the proposed Religion Law as "improper proselytism", the Article
identifies this as preaching to people of other faiths "with the aim of
changing their faith" using or threatening "physical or psychological
violence"; preaching while providing material or social help; abusing an
individual's dependency while preaching; arousing hatred of other religions
or religious organisations; "persecuting" an individual more than once; or
preaching to children without their parents' consent.
Successive proposed Religion Law amendments have tried to introduce a
concept of "soul-hunting" (hogevorsutyun), a derogatory term in Armenian
for sharing one's faith, and make it a punishable offence.
Article 4 of the proposed new Religion Law bans "soul-hunting" and
specifies that it is subject to administrative and criminal punishments. A
new Article 160.1 would be added to the Criminal Code punishes
"soul-hunting" with fines of up to 300 times the minimum monthly wage or up
to two months' imprisonment when done by individuals. If done by a group or
by officials using their official position, it carries a fine of up to 500
times the minimum monthly wage or a maximum two years' imprisonment.
The term "soul-hunting" is used to encourage religious intolerance leading
to violations of freedom of religion or belief (see reports by the
Collaboration For Democracy Centre
and the Helsinki Committee of Armenia
).
- Denial of legal status to small communities, compulsory registration
Article 5 of the proposed new Religion Law divides communities into groups
of fewer than 25 adult members, which cannot gain legal status, and
religious organisations, with more than 25 adult members. Under Article 6,
organisations must register.
A new Article 205.3 of the Administrative Code would punish leaders of
religious organisations which refuse to register with a fine of 100 to 600
times the minimum monthly wage.
- Do unregistered communities have rights?
Article 8 of the proposed Religion Law sets out what rights religious
organisations have, such as to conduct rituals or teach religion. It states
that registered religious organisations only receive such rights on
registration. But the proposed Law does not specifically declare - as the
human rights standards Armenia has signed state - that everyone has these
rights without a need for registration. Officials in the former Soviet
republics often interpret a lack of specific permission to imply that such
rights do not exist without such permission.
- Intrusive and unclear information demands
Under Article 6, communities applying for registration must provide much
information with its statute, including the "nature of the religious
organisation" as well as a "description of the religion or belief". The Law
does not specify whether a brief statement will be enough or whether this
requires a detailed exposition of a community's entire beliefs.
It is unclear whether - as in the 2009 proposals - this will lead to
officials or the Apostolic Church making and enforcing judgments on which
beliefs or doctrines registered communities will be permitted to hold (see
F18News 24 March 2009
).
Religious organisations must provide much internal information annually to
the Justice Ministry and publish it on their own officially recognised
website. It remains unclear what a community without a website does. The
required information - whose level of detail is unclear from the text -
includes: expenditure and income, including "membership fees" (Forum 18 is
not aware of any religious community in Armenia which charges "membership
fees"); details of all "programmes" (undefined) the religious organisation
has undertaken; numbers of "members" and the addresses of leaders and the
official address.
Failure to publish such information would be punishable, under the revised
Administrative Code Article 206, with fines of 300 to 500 times the minimum
monthly wage.
- Funding
Article 9 contains the provision: "Religious organisations cannot be
financed by foreign governments, individuals and legal entities."
Violations of this are punishable under the revised Article 206 of the
Administrative Code with fines of 700 to 1,000 times the minimum monthly
wage. Forum 18 notes that as the Armenian Apostolic Church, the Armenian
Catholic Church and many Protestant churches are among religious
communities which depend heavily on foreign funding, such a provision would
if impartially applied have a serious impact - notably on the dominant
Apostolic Church.
- Data protection and arbitrary registration rejections?
It remains unclear how the registration authority - the Justice Ministry -
will handle the information supplied (including the confidentiality of
information such as private addresses), and whether any safeguards will be
in place to protect arbitrary rejection of a religious community's
application.
- Registration denials and liquidation
Article 7 provides reasons for the Justice Ministry to deny registration,
while Article 13 allows for the Justice Ministry to go to court to have a
religious organisation suspended for six months or, under Article 14,
liquidated. Religious organisations can be liquidated if they provided
"false information of significance" when registering, if they promote
ethnic or religious hatred, or if they fail to remove violations they have
been warned about or repeat them within a year. Providing "clearly false
information" is punishable with a fine of 300 to 500 times the minimum
monthly wage under the revised Article 206 of the Administrative Code.
Why?
Sargsyan of the Justice Ministry insisted to Forum 18 that the Religion Law
and other legal changes were necessary to bring them into line with changes
in recent years to Armenia's Constitution. The 2005 Constitutional
amendments recognised "the exclusive historical mission of the Armenian
Apostolic Holy Church as a national church, in the spiritual life,
development of the national culture and preservation of the national
identity of the people of Armenia".
In February, Justice Minister Tovmasyan noted that respecting the rights of
the Apostolic Church was not a reason to restrict the rights to religious
freedom of members of other religious communities (see F18News 24 February
2011 ).
The Justification for the legal changes, published together with the draft
texts on 12 July, also points to the Constitutional changes, as well as to
Armenia's international commitments as a member of the Council of Europe.
They did not explain why much of the advice of the Venice Commission review
has apparently been ignored.
The Justification notes "shortcomings" in the current Religion Law,
specifically pointing to the rights given at present only to "citizens",
which it correctly notes is not in accord with provisions of the European
Convention on Human Rights. This was one of the numerous problems
highlighted by the Venice Commission / OSCE reviews. It also notes that the
current law does not specify the right to change one's religion. It also
claims the need to "regulate" the religious education of children and to
protect children from being preached to without their parents' consent.
The Justification insists that "soul-hunting (proselytism)" needs to be
dealt with in law, but does not explain why this is needed, how this
matches Armenia's international human rights obligations, and how this
deals with the use of the term to encourage intolerance.
It also fails to explain what concrete specific problems, which have
happened in Armenia, the restrictive parts of the amendments are designed
to solve.
Amendments are "absurd" and "a censorship tool"
Danielyan of the Collaboration for Democracy Centre noted that the Justice
Ministry has taken account of several Venice Commission recommendations,
particularly in extending rights to everyone, not just to citizens. But he
remains adamant that the current texts are worse than their predecessors.
He described as "absurd" the Articles covering "soul-hunting" and
punishments for it, and the procedure for "suspending" religious
organisations. "The draft Law does not say if, during a suspension of up to
six months, people will be able to meet and pray," Danielyan complained to
Forum 18. He also objected to the compulsory registration for communities
with more than 25 adults. "Why should groups have to register if they don't
want to?"
Danielyan also questioned the privileges granted to the Armenian Apostolic
Church and said it was unclear whether that Church was subject to the same
provisions as other religious organisations. "If Armenian Apostolic priests
go into schools, will they have to get the same permission from all parents
that other communities would have to get?"
As for the extensive annual reporting by religious organisations to the
Justice Ministry, Danielyan maintained: "They want everyone to be under
their control."
Danielyan also pointed to the provisions banning promotion of "religious
hatred". "At first glance this looks good," he told Forum 18. "But in
reality it will be used as a censorship tool - if I speak badly of the
Catholicos, even about previous Catholicoses in history. This will only be
used to protect the Armenian Apostolic Church."
Media coverage in Armenia is often highly intolerant of religious
minorities, at times accusing them of crimes they have not committed (see
F18News 12 July 2011 ).
Pastor Leonian, head of an Evangelical Church which has 45 congregations
across Armenia, told Forum 18 his communities have the same concerns they
had with the previous drafts. He believes the reduction of the proposed
threshold for gaining registration from 500 in the previous draft to 25 is
in order to ensure state control, pointing out the requirement for annual
submission of detailed information.
Pastor Leonian expressed great concern about the provisions over
"soul-hunting". "At first mention they speak of 'improper soul-hunting',
but then they just talk about 'soul-hunting'."
He welcomes the removal of Article 17 of the current Religion Law, which
grants a monopoly on preaching to the Armenian Apostolic Church, but
laments that this has now been incorporated instead into the new Article
12.1 of the 2007 Law on Relations between the Republic of Armenia and the
Armenian Apostolic Church.
The Council of Churches Baptists - who refuse to register in principle in
any of the former Soviet republics where they operate, believing that this
leads to unwarranted state interference in their internal affairs - have
several small congregations in Armenia, with the two largest in Yerevan and
in Armavir, a town west of the capital. Several church members told Forum
18 on 13 July that even if compulsory registration and punishments for
those who refuse are introduced, they would continue to meet for worship
without seeking registration.
Fr Arseni Grigoryants, priest of Yerevan's Russian Orthodox Church, broadly
supports the drafts, believing that "more than before they are in accord
with the demands of contemporary international democratic norms". However,
the proposed Religion Law should go further in its "harsh attitude to
incidents of proselytism", he told Forum 18 from Yerevan on 14 July. He
lamented the current lack of "juridical mechanisms" for punishing spreading
one's faith, which he claimed causes "deliberate harm to the spiritual
health of the nation and individuals". He welcomed the drafts' "attempts to
provide these mechanisms".
Fr Grigoryants lamented that his Church's suggestions of a three-tier level
of recognition was not adopted, with the Armenian Apostolic Church in the
dominant position, followed by "traditional confessions" (which he did not
identify), and a third category of "other religious organisations". He told
Forum 18 that this would better protect Armenia from "targeted destructive
foreign influence".
Forum 18 tried to reach Fr Vahram Melikyan, spokesperson for the Armenian
Apostolic Church, between 12 and 14 July, but he was not in the office and
did not answer his mobile phone. Forum 18 also tried to seek comments from
a range of other religious communities.
Discussion begins
Within hours of the Justice Ministry's publication of the proposed drafts,
human rights defenders and religious communities began assessing them.
A group of Protestant churches met in Yerevan on 14 July. Danielyan of the
Collaboration for Democracy Centre told Forum 18 that several organisations
- including his own, the Open Society Foundation, and the OSCE - are
planning public discussions. They hope that political parties which oppose
the proposals - he named the Heritage Party (which has seven deputies in
its parliamentary faction) and possibly Prosperous Armenia (which has 26
deputies) - will also discuss the proposals.
Proposals for a new Religion Law and other legal changes come as the
government's proposed amendments to the 2003 Alternative Service Law are in
Parliament. It remains unclear whether these proposed changes will allow
for the creation of a genuinely civilian alternative service, which - in
commitments to the Council of Europe - Armenia should have created by
January 2004 (see F18News 7 July 2011
). (END)
More coverage of freedom of thought, conscience and belief in Armenia and
the unrecognised entity of Nagorno-Karabakh is at
A compilation of Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe
(OSCE) freedom of religion or belief commitments can be found at
.
A printer-friendly map of Armenia is available at
.
(END)
© Forum 18 News Service. All rights reserved. ISSN 1504-2855
You may reproduce or quote this article provided that credit is given to
F18News http://www.forum18.org/
Past and current Forum 18 information can be found at
http://www.forum18.org/
From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress
http://www.forum18.org/
The right to believe, to worship and witness
The right to change one's belief or religion
The right to join together and express one's belief
===============================================
Thursday 14 July 2011
ARMENIA: "A KIND OF THEATRICAL FARCE - I SEE NO PROGRESS"
Human rights defenders and some religious communities have expressed
concern over provisions of a proposed new Religion Law and amendments to
the Law on the State and the Armenian Church, and to the Criminal and
Administrative Codes. They told Forum 18 News Service of their concerns
over: the ban on "soul-hunting", defined as "improper proselytism", which
could be punished by up to two months' imprisonment (up to two years' if
done by more than one person); compulsory religious registration for
communities of more than 25 adults; and vague formulations which some
religious communities fear could be used against them. The Justice Ministry
published the drafts on 12 July. "These proposed amendments are repressive
and a lot worse than the previous version," Stepan Danielyan of the
Collaboration for Democracy Centre told Forum 18. But Russian Orthodox
priest Fr Arseni Grigoryants welcomed the drafts' "harsh attitude to
incidents of proselytism" and "attempts to provide [juridical] mechanisms"
to punish them.
ARMENIA: "A KIND OF THEATRICAL FARCE - I SEE NO PROGRESS"
By Felix Corley, Forum 18 News Service
Human rights defenders and members of some religious minorities have
reacted critically to drafts of a proposed new Religion Law, as well as
changes to the Law on Relations between the Republic of Armenia and the
Armenian Apostolic Church, and to the Criminal and Administrative Codes.
The draft laws were made public on 12 July. "These proposed amendments are
repressive and a lot worse than the previous version," Stepan Danielyan of
the Collaboration for Democracy Centre told Forum 18 News Service from the
Armenian capital Yerevan on 13 July. "In practice they would be used to
repress religious organisations." Evangelical Pastor René Leonian is
equally critical of the drafts and the government's approach. "This is a
kind of theatrical farce," he told Forum 18 from Yerevan the same day. "I
see no progress."
The major proposals Armenian religious communities and human rights
defenders have so far expressed concern about include: proposed punishments
for sharing one's faith; compulsory registration for any religious
community with more than 25 members, with punishments for those who do not
register; as well as the vague formulation of many provisions. All of these
are thought likely to leave followers of religious organisations the
government - or the powerful Armenian Apostolic Church - dislikes
vulnerable to arbitrary and tight restrictions on their freedom of religion
or belief.
Why is Justice Ministry hostile to public discussion?
The Justice Ministry prepared the draft Amendments, and intended to send
them to the Council of Europe's Venice Commission without public discussion
- even though Justice Minister Hrair Tovmasyan had publicly promised that
they would be publicly discussed before being sent to the Venice Commission
(see F18News 24 February 2011
).
Karen Hakopyan, Head of the Department of Normative Acts at the Justice
Ministry, told Forum 18 on 6 July categorically that the draft texts would
not be made public and would be sent to the Council of Europe's Venice
Commission without any public discussion. Similarly, Nora Sargsyan, an aide
to Minister Tovmasyan who played a key role in preparing the new drafts,
insisted to Forum 18 from Yerevan on 9 July (before the drafts were
published) that the texts were not being made public and were being
translated into English to be sent only to the Venice Commission.
This is the same highly controversial procedure that was followed for the
previous proposed amendments, which only became known in Armenia when they
were placed - in English only - on the Venice Commission website (see
F18News 8 December 2010
).
Hakopyan of the Justice Ministry, as well as another senior official
involved in the process in the central government apparatus (who asked not
to be identified because they are not authorised to talk to the media),
told Forum 18 on 6 July that the Justice Ministry sent the draft texts to
the central government apparatus on 29 June.
The senior government official told Forum 18 that the government's
religious affairs official Vardan Astsatryan of the Department for Ethnic
Minorities and Religious Affairs was preparing an opinion on the drafts and
that the government has not yet approved them. Astsatryan's telephone went
unanswered each time Forum 18 called between 6 and 14 July.
However, by 11 July the Justice Ministry had changed its position and
posted the texts on its website on 12 July. "The draft text will be
published so that we can receive comments from the public," Deputy Justice
Minister Emil Babayan told Forum 18 the day before they were made public.
However, the Justice Ministry website posted the texts without any comment
or invitation for comments from the public. Babayan insisted that comments
would be sought from the Venice Commission at the same time as comments
from interested parties within Armenia. "The Venice Commission is one of
those parties. This is a simultaneous, twin-track process. All comments
will be taken into account."
Justice Minister keeping his promises?
Following strong criticism of earlier drafts, including severe criticisms
made of them and the existing Religion Law by a December 2010 joint Council
of Europe Venice Commission / Organisation for Security and Co-operation in
Europe (OSCE) legal review, Justice Minister Tovmasyan on 17 February 2011
promised that the proposals would be re-drafted to take account of the
criticisms. Before a large audience of civil society activists, religious
communities, local journalists and Venice Commission member Finola
Flanagan, Tovmasyan specifically highlighted for the re-draft the need to:
- avoid defining proselytism or soul-hunting, as this may attack the right
to share beliefs, but defining precisely what actions are prohibited;
- on the right to legal personality that unregistered religious activity
should be permitted, that high minimum numbers of members to register a
community should be avoided;
- that the actions of some members should not be a reason to liquidate
entire communities, and that liquidation should be a final resort after
other warnings and penalties have been exhausted;
- and that the state must respect the rights of parents to decide on the
education of children in line with their own religion or beliefs (see
F18News 24 February 2011
).
However, the latest July proposals appear to have largely ignored
Tovmasyan's public commitments. It also appears, as the Venice Commission
itself noted in its December 2010 Opinion, that "the drafters in many
instances do not appear to have taken into account the recommendations in
the 2009 Joint Opinion" - or the 2010 Opinion (see F18News 20 January 2011
).
The 2009 Joint Opinion was highly critical of an earlier restrictive set of
Religion Law amendments, which Parliament passed on first reading in March
2009 (see F18News 2 July 2009
). Although these
proposed amendments appear to have stalled, Parliament could still revive
them.
On 14 July Forum 18 asked the Justice Ministry press office in writing to
ask Minister Tovmasyan why the specific commitments on the content appear
largely not to have been met and why the promise to hold a public
consultation within Armenia before the texts were sent to the Venice
Commission appears to have been abandoned. Forum 18 had received no reply
by the end of the working day.
"Brought into line with Armenia's Constitution and with OSCE standards"
Human rights defenders and religious communities insist that the latest
amendments restrict the right to religious freedom. But despite this, Nora
Sargsyan, Minister Tovmasyan's aide who played a key role in preparing the
new drafts, claimed to Forum 18 that the amendments have been "brought into
line with Armenia's Constitution and with OSCE standards". Despite her
confidence in this, she would not on 9 July give Forum 18 a copy of the
drafts and said at that time that they would not be made public.
On 14 July, after the drafts were made public contrary to Sargsyan's
earlier assurances, she declined to discuss any of the provisions with
Forum 18.
Several informed sources have strongly suggested to Forum 18 that the
Armenian Apostolic Church has been closely involved in the repeated
restrictive drafts, even to the extent of drafting texts for them. Sargsyan
insisted though that the Apostolic Church (which has its headquarters at
Echmiadzin near Yerevan) had nothing to do with preparing the drafts.
"Echmiadzin is not responsible for legislative policy in Armenia," she told
Forum 18. "Echmiadzin may be part of public discussion like anyone else."
What is in the new proposals?
The latest published amendments are a proposed new Religion Law, as well as
changes to the Law on Relations between the State and the Armenian
Apostolic Church, and to the Criminal and Administrative Codes. The new
proposed Religion Law would entirely replace the current Religion Law first
adopted in 1991 and amended several times since, notably in 1997 and 2001.
The main proposals that so far most concern Armenian human rights defenders
and religious communities are outlined below. As discussion continues in
Armenia (see below), further concerns may be raised.
- Freedom of religion or belief dangerous?
Many provisions of the proposed new Religion Law give the impression that
allowing freedom of religion or belief is potentially dangerous, and that
religious communities must be subject to special scrutiny. Religious
communities are banned from functioning "in secret", using "preaching
influence on persons holding other religious affiliation or views which is
not compatible with respect for freedom of conscience, religion or belief",
or controlling the "private life, health, property and behaviour" of
adherents. They are required to act in accordance with Armenia's
Constitution and Laws and respect others' religious or theological
affiliation.
- Children's rights
Preaching to children under 14 without their parents' consent is banned and
punishable. Forum 18 is not aware that any faiths in Armenia engage in this
practice with the exception of the Armenian Apostolic Church, whose priests
sometimes address children in schools without their parents' express
consent.
- "Soul-hunting"
Crucially, "soul-hunting" is banned and punishable under amendments to both
the Criminal and Administrative Codes. Defined on first mention in Article
4 of the proposed Religion Law as "improper proselytism", the Article
identifies this as preaching to people of other faiths "with the aim of
changing their faith" using or threatening "physical or psychological
violence"; preaching while providing material or social help; abusing an
individual's dependency while preaching; arousing hatred of other religions
or religious organisations; "persecuting" an individual more than once; or
preaching to children without their parents' consent.
Successive proposed Religion Law amendments have tried to introduce a
concept of "soul-hunting" (hogevorsutyun), a derogatory term in Armenian
for sharing one's faith, and make it a punishable offence.
Article 4 of the proposed new Religion Law bans "soul-hunting" and
specifies that it is subject to administrative and criminal punishments. A
new Article 160.1 would be added to the Criminal Code punishes
"soul-hunting" with fines of up to 300 times the minimum monthly wage or up
to two months' imprisonment when done by individuals. If done by a group or
by officials using their official position, it carries a fine of up to 500
times the minimum monthly wage or a maximum two years' imprisonment.
The term "soul-hunting" is used to encourage religious intolerance leading
to violations of freedom of religion or belief (see reports by the
Collaboration For Democracy Centre
and the Helsinki Committee of Armenia
).
- Denial of legal status to small communities, compulsory registration
Article 5 of the proposed new Religion Law divides communities into groups
of fewer than 25 adult members, which cannot gain legal status, and
religious organisations, with more than 25 adult members. Under Article 6,
organisations must register.
A new Article 205.3 of the Administrative Code would punish leaders of
religious organisations which refuse to register with a fine of 100 to 600
times the minimum monthly wage.
- Do unregistered communities have rights?
Article 8 of the proposed Religion Law sets out what rights religious
organisations have, such as to conduct rituals or teach religion. It states
that registered religious organisations only receive such rights on
registration. But the proposed Law does not specifically declare - as the
human rights standards Armenia has signed state - that everyone has these
rights without a need for registration. Officials in the former Soviet
republics often interpret a lack of specific permission to imply that such
rights do not exist without such permission.
- Intrusive and unclear information demands
Under Article 6, communities applying for registration must provide much
information with its statute, including the "nature of the religious
organisation" as well as a "description of the religion or belief". The Law
does not specify whether a brief statement will be enough or whether this
requires a detailed exposition of a community's entire beliefs.
It is unclear whether - as in the 2009 proposals - this will lead to
officials or the Apostolic Church making and enforcing judgments on which
beliefs or doctrines registered communities will be permitted to hold (see
F18News 24 March 2009
).
Religious organisations must provide much internal information annually to
the Justice Ministry and publish it on their own officially recognised
website. It remains unclear what a community without a website does. The
required information - whose level of detail is unclear from the text -
includes: expenditure and income, including "membership fees" (Forum 18 is
not aware of any religious community in Armenia which charges "membership
fees"); details of all "programmes" (undefined) the religious organisation
has undertaken; numbers of "members" and the addresses of leaders and the
official address.
Failure to publish such information would be punishable, under the revised
Administrative Code Article 206, with fines of 300 to 500 times the minimum
monthly wage.
- Funding
Article 9 contains the provision: "Religious organisations cannot be
financed by foreign governments, individuals and legal entities."
Violations of this are punishable under the revised Article 206 of the
Administrative Code with fines of 700 to 1,000 times the minimum monthly
wage. Forum 18 notes that as the Armenian Apostolic Church, the Armenian
Catholic Church and many Protestant churches are among religious
communities which depend heavily on foreign funding, such a provision would
if impartially applied have a serious impact - notably on the dominant
Apostolic Church.
- Data protection and arbitrary registration rejections?
It remains unclear how the registration authority - the Justice Ministry -
will handle the information supplied (including the confidentiality of
information such as private addresses), and whether any safeguards will be
in place to protect arbitrary rejection of a religious community's
application.
- Registration denials and liquidation
Article 7 provides reasons for the Justice Ministry to deny registration,
while Article 13 allows for the Justice Ministry to go to court to have a
religious organisation suspended for six months or, under Article 14,
liquidated. Religious organisations can be liquidated if they provided
"false information of significance" when registering, if they promote
ethnic or religious hatred, or if they fail to remove violations they have
been warned about or repeat them within a year. Providing "clearly false
information" is punishable with a fine of 300 to 500 times the minimum
monthly wage under the revised Article 206 of the Administrative Code.
Why?
Sargsyan of the Justice Ministry insisted to Forum 18 that the Religion Law
and other legal changes were necessary to bring them into line with changes
in recent years to Armenia's Constitution. The 2005 Constitutional
amendments recognised "the exclusive historical mission of the Armenian
Apostolic Holy Church as a national church, in the spiritual life,
development of the national culture and preservation of the national
identity of the people of Armenia".
In February, Justice Minister Tovmasyan noted that respecting the rights of
the Apostolic Church was not a reason to restrict the rights to religious
freedom of members of other religious communities (see F18News 24 February
2011 ).
The Justification for the legal changes, published together with the draft
texts on 12 July, also points to the Constitutional changes, as well as to
Armenia's international commitments as a member of the Council of Europe.
They did not explain why much of the advice of the Venice Commission review
has apparently been ignored.
The Justification notes "shortcomings" in the current Religion Law,
specifically pointing to the rights given at present only to "citizens",
which it correctly notes is not in accord with provisions of the European
Convention on Human Rights. This was one of the numerous problems
highlighted by the Venice Commission / OSCE reviews. It also notes that the
current law does not specify the right to change one's religion. It also
claims the need to "regulate" the religious education of children and to
protect children from being preached to without their parents' consent.
The Justification insists that "soul-hunting (proselytism)" needs to be
dealt with in law, but does not explain why this is needed, how this
matches Armenia's international human rights obligations, and how this
deals with the use of the term to encourage intolerance.
It also fails to explain what concrete specific problems, which have
happened in Armenia, the restrictive parts of the amendments are designed
to solve.
Amendments are "absurd" and "a censorship tool"
Danielyan of the Collaboration for Democracy Centre noted that the Justice
Ministry has taken account of several Venice Commission recommendations,
particularly in extending rights to everyone, not just to citizens. But he
remains adamant that the current texts are worse than their predecessors.
He described as "absurd" the Articles covering "soul-hunting" and
punishments for it, and the procedure for "suspending" religious
organisations. "The draft Law does not say if, during a suspension of up to
six months, people will be able to meet and pray," Danielyan complained to
Forum 18. He also objected to the compulsory registration for communities
with more than 25 adults. "Why should groups have to register if they don't
want to?"
Danielyan also questioned the privileges granted to the Armenian Apostolic
Church and said it was unclear whether that Church was subject to the same
provisions as other religious organisations. "If Armenian Apostolic priests
go into schools, will they have to get the same permission from all parents
that other communities would have to get?"
As for the extensive annual reporting by religious organisations to the
Justice Ministry, Danielyan maintained: "They want everyone to be under
their control."
Danielyan also pointed to the provisions banning promotion of "religious
hatred". "At first glance this looks good," he told Forum 18. "But in
reality it will be used as a censorship tool - if I speak badly of the
Catholicos, even about previous Catholicoses in history. This will only be
used to protect the Armenian Apostolic Church."
Media coverage in Armenia is often highly intolerant of religious
minorities, at times accusing them of crimes they have not committed (see
F18News 12 July 2011 ).
Pastor Leonian, head of an Evangelical Church which has 45 congregations
across Armenia, told Forum 18 his communities have the same concerns they
had with the previous drafts. He believes the reduction of the proposed
threshold for gaining registration from 500 in the previous draft to 25 is
in order to ensure state control, pointing out the requirement for annual
submission of detailed information.
Pastor Leonian expressed great concern about the provisions over
"soul-hunting". "At first mention they speak of 'improper soul-hunting',
but then they just talk about 'soul-hunting'."
He welcomes the removal of Article 17 of the current Religion Law, which
grants a monopoly on preaching to the Armenian Apostolic Church, but
laments that this has now been incorporated instead into the new Article
12.1 of the 2007 Law on Relations between the Republic of Armenia and the
Armenian Apostolic Church.
The Council of Churches Baptists - who refuse to register in principle in
any of the former Soviet republics where they operate, believing that this
leads to unwarranted state interference in their internal affairs - have
several small congregations in Armenia, with the two largest in Yerevan and
in Armavir, a town west of the capital. Several church members told Forum
18 on 13 July that even if compulsory registration and punishments for
those who refuse are introduced, they would continue to meet for worship
without seeking registration.
Fr Arseni Grigoryants, priest of Yerevan's Russian Orthodox Church, broadly
supports the drafts, believing that "more than before they are in accord
with the demands of contemporary international democratic norms". However,
the proposed Religion Law should go further in its "harsh attitude to
incidents of proselytism", he told Forum 18 from Yerevan on 14 July. He
lamented the current lack of "juridical mechanisms" for punishing spreading
one's faith, which he claimed causes "deliberate harm to the spiritual
health of the nation and individuals". He welcomed the drafts' "attempts to
provide these mechanisms".
Fr Grigoryants lamented that his Church's suggestions of a three-tier level
of recognition was not adopted, with the Armenian Apostolic Church in the
dominant position, followed by "traditional confessions" (which he did not
identify), and a third category of "other religious organisations". He told
Forum 18 that this would better protect Armenia from "targeted destructive
foreign influence".
Forum 18 tried to reach Fr Vahram Melikyan, spokesperson for the Armenian
Apostolic Church, between 12 and 14 July, but he was not in the office and
did not answer his mobile phone. Forum 18 also tried to seek comments from
a range of other religious communities.
Discussion begins
Within hours of the Justice Ministry's publication of the proposed drafts,
human rights defenders and religious communities began assessing them.
A group of Protestant churches met in Yerevan on 14 July. Danielyan of the
Collaboration for Democracy Centre told Forum 18 that several organisations
- including his own, the Open Society Foundation, and the OSCE - are
planning public discussions. They hope that political parties which oppose
the proposals - he named the Heritage Party (which has seven deputies in
its parliamentary faction) and possibly Prosperous Armenia (which has 26
deputies) - will also discuss the proposals.
Proposals for a new Religion Law and other legal changes come as the
government's proposed amendments to the 2003 Alternative Service Law are in
Parliament. It remains unclear whether these proposed changes will allow
for the creation of a genuinely civilian alternative service, which - in
commitments to the Council of Europe - Armenia should have created by
January 2004 (see F18News 7 July 2011
). (END)
More coverage of freedom of thought, conscience and belief in Armenia and
the unrecognised entity of Nagorno-Karabakh is at
A compilation of Organisation for Security and Co-operation in Europe
(OSCE) freedom of religion or belief commitments can be found at
.
A printer-friendly map of Armenia is available at
.
(END)
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From: Emil Lazarian | Ararat NewsPress