Advancing Domestic Workers Rights Agenda in Armenia

On February 29, the Human Rights Research Centers (HRRC) in consortium with the Caucasus Research Resource Center - Armenia (CRRC-Armenia) and the UN-Women Armenia, presented the findings of ongoing comprehensive research on the protection of the rights of domestic workers in Armenia.

The purpose of this joint research project is to formulate the agenda for ensuring decent working conditions and an environment free from exploitation for domestic workers in Armenia.

Anahit Simonyan, the Director of the Human Rights Rights Research (HRRC), particularly noted that the issues of protection of the labor rights of domestic workers have so far been left out of sectoral priorities and state strategies, meanwhile those all are important issues of protection of human rights and labor rights in Armenia.

HRRC's legal expert Izabella Iskandaryan holistically presented the essence and the importance of domestic work, elaborate on what does it mean to provide decent work for domestic workers, what are the legal and practical problems in the Armenian context, proposed suggestions recommendation brought forward by the research, referring to the relevant international standards, in particular, the regulations provided by ILO C189- Domestic Workers Convention, as well as other ILO instruments (such ILO C155, 187, 190).

Arusyak Voskanyan, the analyst of CRRC-Armenia, presented the socio-economic context of the problem, the available statistical data, as well as summarized the qualitative data collected so far within the framework of the research, presenting valuable information about the working conditions of domestic workers and their work-related problems.

Representatives of non-governmental organizations, state bodies, academic and expert circles participated in the presentation. The participants emphasized the importance of the work carried out by the consortium, as well as contributed to the discussion with their valuable observations and remarks.

Together with its partners, the Human Rights Research Center is committed to engaging in active discussions with field representatives to find and localize legal and practical solutions, laying the groundwork for safeguarding the rights of domestic workers.

This program is funded by the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation and the Austrian Development Agency.