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On October 11, Media Advisory Discussion on Women’s Participation in Political Life on the initiative of the Electoral Reform Working Group was held, where the RA NA Vice President Lena Nazaryan, the NA deputies, the USAID/ Armenia Mission Director Deborah Grieser, the representatives of the NGOs and experts took part.

Highlighting similar events, the RA NA Vice President Lena Nazaryan noted that she had initiated discussions on creating legislative mechanisms for providing women’s involvement in the Government and in the NA. According to her, women’s quota in the Electoral Code should be reached to 40%. “At present, in the Electoral Code the representation of one gender should not exceed 70%. I propose that it would not exceed 60%, i.e. we should get the women’s quota to 40%, Lena Nazaryan noted.

According to the USAID/ Armenia Mission Director Deborah Grieser, the studies have shown that the societies, where women are involved in politics are more successful than the others.

The Coordinator of the Electoral Reform Working Group Hamazasp Danielyan, reminding that October 11 is International Day of the Girl Child noted: “Unfortunately, in the 21^st century we have the UN International Day dedicated to girls, and there are problems of protection of women’s rights in Armenia.”

The MP informed that the discussions on the Electoral Code should be held with the participation of all parliamentary factions and in that context noted that on October 18 it would be designed to hold parliamentary hearings to discuss the RA legislative package on Parties.

The international standards were also presented. The participants touched upon the items on inner-party and electoral quotas and the public financing. They have related to the tools of encouragement and punitive measures, as well as the pre-electoral campaign regulations which are directed to the rise of the women’s representation in the party structures and elected bodies.

The event was organized by the International Foundation for Electoral System (IFES), the National Democratic Institute (NDI) and the Oxygen Foundation with financial support from the USAID.