1. Case-study No. & Title:
No. 261. Voluntary judicial support for the Russian-speaking population of Yerevan (Armenia) who do not speak the Armenian language, in which all legal and clerical work is conducted.

Keywords

2. Author information:
2.1 Author’s Name
Elza-Bair Goutchinova

2.2 Institutional Affiliation and Contact Details:
Institute of Ethnology and Anthropology
Russian Academy of Sciences

Tel.: 3741 - 541675
E-mail: goutchie@arm.r.am

2.3 Date recorded
15/05/2001

3. Good Practice Information Sheet
3.1 Local Level Good Practice:
"Rossia"- a public organisation of Slavic communities residing in Armenia - has arranged free judicial help for the Russian-speaking population of Armenia who find it difficult to orientate themselves in the legal field, to deal with legal papers issued only in the state language – Armenian.

3.2 Location:
The city of Yerevan, the Republic of Armenia.

3.3 Minority/Target Groups:
Minority: Russians and Russian-speaking population

3.4 Major Actors Involved

3.5 Budget allocated by local government authorities and/or by other actors
Legal department workers, on a voluntary basis, give legal advice to the members of the public organization "Rossia" at its office. No special financial help has been provided to realize these activities

3.6 Timeframe
The Legal Department of the public organization "Rossia" began working in 1992, and it has been functioning since then.

3.7 Local level good practice relation to national level ethnic policy
The Armenian Republic National Assembly has not yet adopted the law on "National Minorities", which has been drafted at the Board for Migration and Refugees’ Affairs of RA. Not a single representative of the public ethnic organisations registered in the Republic of Armenia has entered the Commission, that has been set up in this connection. According to the Law of Language, the state language of the Republic of Armenia (RA) is Armenian. Armenian is also the language of Legal Proceedings according to the Penalty Code of RA, Civil Code, and the Law of Legal Proceedings. In line with those acts a translator and a lawyer must be provided when legal proceedings are conducted that involve residents of RA who do not know the Armenian language. However, there is as yet shortage of professional translators familiar with judicial terminology in both languages. Under these conditions the voluntary legal help of a Russian-speaking lawyer is very important for needy individuals who find themselves in a difficult situation.

4. Good Practice Description
According to the latest general census of the population in 1989 52,000 Russians lived in the Republic of Armenia. During the last decade after the USSR break-up the Russians have been migrating from the republic, most actively during co-called "hard times" when there was no electricity in the country. As there is no new official census, there is no accurate information on the number of Russian community members currently present in Armenia. According to the Institute for CIS (Commonwealth of Independent States) data, there are about 10,000 Russians left in the Republic.

As a rule, the Russian-speaking population of the republic is the most needy, and socially insecure group, who find it difficult or practically impossible to defend their interests in legal institutions in the Armenian language. It is also virtually impossible for these individuals to meet the cost of a lawyer’s services.

Not knowing the Armenian language, which is used in all the spheres of the state clerical work, and under the conditions of general legal ignorance of the permanently changing legislation, many people of Slavic origin fell victim to unscrupulous office workers as well as to swindling and deception in legal transactions with deceitful partners. Despite this the state bodies charged with controlling the legality of transactions often does not pay due attention to the well-grounded complaints of the ethnic minority’s representatives.

To address these problem "Rossia", ever since its establishment in 1992, has operated a legal advice office, providing the Russian-speaking population with legal help. Some members of the organization with higher-levels of legal education share their knowledge with those in need. These volunteers give legal consultation, reveal cases of the society members’ lawful rights being violated, and defend their rights at every level. They also help to draw up and complete different legal papers, represent and defend the lawful rights of the Russian-speaking population of Armenia in the courts, state institutions, and local self-governing bodies, render legal assistance in relation to the problems of migration, citizenship, and other problems.

The most common transactions in which the organization’s members appeared to become victims included sales and purchases, gifts, exchanges, rental payments, and inheritance.

In trying to solve these and similar problems the lawyers managed to secure fair rulings in line with the law: restored the rights of the realty owners, compelled the re-instatement of illegally fired employees, returned to their owners papers illegally confiscated by the militia, etc.

Old single people whose children have left Armenia are among those who often seek legal help, so the lawyer becomes a close adviser on the problems of inheritance. As a rule, elderly individuals will wish to leave their property(a flat, a house, or a plot of land) to their relatives who are already Russian citizens by means of a will, or they will wish to sell their property to join them.

In addition to the above-mentioned examples, the legal advice office sees to it that in line with the achieved agreement between Russia and Armenia, Russian citizens of draft age residing on the Armenian territory are called up to the part of the Russian Army located in Armenia.