AZG Armenian Daily #034, 25/02/2005
Meeting
ROLE OF MASS MEDIA IN BUILDING A JURAL STATE
On Feb. 23 Femida NGO invited Ashot Mkrtchian, head of the Anti-Drug
Department, and Sayat Shirinian, head of Department for Public Relations of
the RA Police, to meet the media within the frameworks of European
Commission’s “Role of Mass Media in Building a Jural State” program. Mr.
Mkrtchian gave a brief overview of the anti-drug campaign in the republic
and noted that the drugs are the most serious problem that the world faces
today. In comparison with the European states, situation in Armenia “is
better and is still amenable to control”. Being situated on the crossroad of
drug trafficking countries, Armenia will face serious problems if turned
into a transit country.
Concerning woman trafficking, Mr. Mkrtchian stated that this phenomenon has
a 10-year history in Armenia and noted that a number of NGOs and mass medias
exaggerate figures”. “There are souteneurs who organize this work, but they
are not many”, he said. According to the police figures, 22 prostitutes left
Armenia in 2000 to work abroad, 19 in 2001, 26 in 2002, 21 in 2003, 32 in
2004. Two of them were engaged in human trafficking. There were 13 Armenian
prostitutes in Arabian Emirates; 9 more ponces in UAE are wanted.
By Marietta Makarian