Yerevan Women’s Support Center Director Discusses Efforts to Combat Domestic Violence in Watertown Talk

Armenian politicians on Women’s Day, March 8, issue statements stressing procreation, obedience, and beauty as important aspects of women’s lives. Nobody mentions women’s intellect, creativity, or leadership abilities. On the other hand, Matosian gave examples of violence emerging in various incidents involving politicians, who slap or hit women in public.

Matosian declared that domestic violence is fed by patriarchy, gender stereotypes and cultural violence, and all three exist in Armenia. According to the OSCE and Amnesty International, one in four women in Armenia experience domestic violence, while sixty percent report domestic abuse. Furthermore, other studies show that a majority of Armenians justify such abuse.

To change this situation, the WSC, Matosian said, works to empower women through its safe house, legal assistance, psychological counselling, employment assistance and victim education. It tries to educate communities and in particular journalists, social workers and police officers. Finally, it attempts to engage stakeholders to make systemic changes in Armenia. Just helping individual victims will not change the overall situation, Matosian said.

At this point, Matosian screened a short video about the work of the center prepared in 2015, for the center’s fifth anniversary. It included testimony of some survivors of violence who explained how the center helped them, allowing them, and in some cases their children, to fashion happy healthy lives.

Afterwards, Matosian provided further details. The women’s safehouse, she said, is in a confidential location and serves 40-50 women and children annually. Women usually stay up to three months. In 2017, 2,024 telephone calls were fielded, and 307 women were helped there. Seventy-three percent enjoy lives free of abuse afterwards. This figure, Matosian explained, was high even for the US, but it was because the women know that if they went back to their abusers they would be killed. In addition, 57 percent of WSC clients were able to find employment.

The center promotes activism, because, as Maro said in Armenian, the crying baby gets the milk. For example, when maternity leave was being cut in a ministry, women and their babies protested, and 20,000 signatures were collected within a week, so this cut was retracted. Another time, polyclinics were going to stop giving free vaccines and medical care to young children up to seven years old but women activists got this retracted too after protests.

Maro portrayed other positive changes in Armenian society. In 2014, the police created a domestic violence department, meaning that for the first time the Armenian state recognized through its very title that domestic violence exists in Armenia. The police who initially would state that women are provoking men now are beginning to understand the seriousness of the situation.

A domestic violence law was passed early this year due both to activism “from below,” and European Union pressure “from above” as part of its conditions for partnership with Armenia. This law provides for training, shelter, protective orders, and the confidentiality of the victim, but, Matosian pointed out, also has gaps, most important of which is the lack of criminalization of the abuser’s acts. Furthermore, insult or “betrayal” of the abuser will diminish any punishment. Mediation is demanded by this law, but the two parties are not equal in power, so this is not helpful. Matosian hopes this law will be improved over time, as took place under similar circumstances in neighboring Georgia.

Interestingly, a Russian foundation backed by the Russian government was funding a campaign in Armenia against the law. During the discussion session, Matosian said that it was part of measures to resist rapprochement of Armenian society with the West. They spread false news such as that children would be taken away from their parents and their organs would be sold, or not allowing children to eat ice cream would be considered abuse.

The Armenian Church, Matosian said, initially opposed the law, but changed its stance when the Armenian government itself changed and started supporting passage of the law.

Matosian declared that other Armenian women’s organizations never went public with their cases domestically, but WSC had two prominent successes which had become major public cases and positive examples. Mariam Gevorkyan was a young woman from a poor family who married a rich fellow villager who had moved to St. Petersburg, Russia. When she came to her new home, the husband’s family took away her passport, and exposed her to severe abuse and even mutilation, primarily through her mother-in-law. Though kept in isolation, her screams concerned the neighbors so much that she was sent back to Armenia.

Now 20, she wanted justice and went through a one-year court trial, with WSC support. The husband was pardoned on president’s day, but her mother-in-law was caught and received three years in prison.

The second big public case was that of Hasmik Khachatryan, who appeared in the WSC fifth anniversary video. Her mother-in-law was a famous fortune teller in favor with the Armenian oligarchy. Consequently, the mother-in-law thought she would easily win the trial against the younger woman, but it received a lot of publicity, including from the international community, as well as protests. Khachatryan went on to have success with a small business baking traditional Armenian sweets, and received recognition in 2017 from the United Nations Population Fund (UNFPA) of Armenia for her willpower, courage and her achievements.

Matosian said the center now has an annual budget of $153,000. Seventy-two percent goes directly to services and medical care for women and children, training sessions and printing. Annual revenues are $145,000 a year.

International grants are not very constant, so it relies primarily on support from the Tufenkian Foundation, AIWA and individual donors. It costs $1,035 to keep a mother and two children for two months in a shelter. That cost includes food, medical care as well as police security.

Matosian concluded with a call for diasporans to work to keep officials in Armenia accountable for their actions. The lack of full participation of Armenian women, who form the majority of the population now, in the economy weakens the country, she said, whereas if there is gender equality, Armenian society would also become more democratic.

After her presentation, Matosian responded to a wide a variety of questions from the audience.

Donors can find out about the WSC at its website (http://www.womensupportcenter.org) and donate through the Tufenkian Foundation.