Freedom of Information Center of Armenia.

On May 8, in Lichk village of Gegharkunik region the Freedom of Information Center expert familiarized a group of young people with the right to be informed.

The participants of the workshop heard for the first time that they had the right to take part in village council meetings. “How do we know the dates of village council meetings?” they asked. It turned out that in this village also the dates and agendas of village council meetings are not announced 7 days before, as it is stated by the RA law on local authorities. Participants of the discussion said that they had written applications, but had never sent information requests. “Unlike written applications, information requests should be answered not within 15, but 5 days”, expert Papin Muradyan said.  

Young people from Lichk village think that awareness lies in the base of knowledge and skills in any sphere and the RA law on Information Freedom gives the opportunity of being informed. Some of the participants were going to apply to the local authorities of Gegharkunik region with questions they were interested in. As a result of the discussion Gegharkunik regional representative of the Educational Development Academy Vahagn Dabaghyan and the head financier of Lichk village council Khachik Hokhikyan promised to henceforth publish the community budget for the village population.