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Red Flags Raised Over State-Funded Ngos Lack Of Activity

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  • Red Flags Raised Over State-Funded Ngos Lack Of Activity

    RED FLAGS RAISED OVER STATE-FUNDED NGOS LACK OF ACTIVITY

    http://asbarez.com/109696/red-flags-raised-over-state-funded-ngos-lack-of-activity/
    Monday, April 29th, 2013

    Armenia's Presidential Palace

    YEREVAN (RFE/RL)-President Serzh Sarkisian's staff has allocated
    some 500 million drams ($1.2 million) in grants to three dozen
    non-governmental organizations that have generally avoided publicizing
    their activities purportedly including human rights advocacy.

    The Yerevan-based Center for Freedom of Information has obtained
    detailed information about the funding, provided from 2010-2012, from
    the Armenian Finance Ministry. The latter had to make it available
    in accordance with Armenia's freedom of information legislation.

    Hardly any of the 31 recipients of the presidential grants has been
    covered by the Armenian media to date. The government data shows that
    many of them were founded and registered with the Justice Ministry
    shortly before receiving state funding.

    According to Arman Saghatelian, Sarkisian's press secretary,
    decisions regarding the funding were made by a team of presidential
    administration officials and representatives of "partner
    organizations." In written comments to RFE/RL's Armenian service
    (Azatutyun.am) sent late last week, Saghatelian said that this
    "monitoring group" oversaw the use of the presidential grants. He
    said it is now looking into ways of making the state assistance to
    the civil society more "program-based and development-oriented."

    One such NGO, called Development and Integration, accounted for the
    single largest share of that assistance. In 2011-2012 it received
    six grants totaling almost 75 million drams. The Justice Ministry's
    electronic registry of Armenian legal entities lists Levon Martirosian,
    a pro-government lawmaker, among its founders.

    Martirosian worked as an assistant to President Sarkisian before
    being elected to parliament in May 2012.

    Practically nothing is known about the activities of Development
    and Integration. The same is true for virtually all other grant
    recipients. Six of them have the same person, Suren Barseghian,
    among their founders.

    Shushan Doydoyan, the director of the Center for Freedom of
    Information, said she has tried in vain to obtain information about
    the work of the 31 NGOs. "This is surprising because nowadays any
    organization is interested in informing as many people as possible
    about their activities," Doydoyan told RFE/RL's Armenian service.

    "However, these NGOs are trying to stay in the shadow."

    Even locating them is not an easy task. Two of them, the self-declared
    human rights group Arbanyak (Satellite) and the Country of Youth
    organization supposedly promoting proper health care, have the
    same registered address. An RFE/RL journalist discovered that their
    purported premises located at an office building in downtown Yerevan
    are now empty. A woman working there, who described herself as the
    building manager, said she has never heard of either organization.

    Another presidentially supported NGO, Educated Generation, claimed
    to have an office on the same street in the city center. It turned
    out to be an empty apartment. Residents of the apartment block were
    unaware of Educated Generation. "I've never heard that name before,"
    said one neighbor.

    This obscurity is in sharp contrast to the high-profile activities of
    Armenia's best-known NGOs that are financed, as a rule, by Western
    governments, international organizations and foreign private
    foundations. Many of them are engaged in civil rights advocacy,
    regularly criticizing the government.

    Levon Barseghian is a veteran pro-democracy campaigner who runs one
    such group, the Gyumri-based Asparez Journalists' Club. "It's unclear
    how newly established NGOs were getting that state funding so quickly,"
    he said. "There was little public awareness of their activities."

    Boris Navasardian, the chairman of the Yerevan Press Club, linked the
    problem with the overall lack of transparency in various tenders and
    funding contests administered by Armenian state bodies. "We know how
    state tenders are handled," he said. "Grants are distributed in the
    same fashion."

    "We want the civil society's activities to be as transparent as
    possible," added Navasardian.

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