Where will children's mother reside?

Since 2006, the resident of the city of Vanadzor Ms Alvard Martirossian and her daughter Inga, who is a musician and a teacher, have been haunting the threshold of the courts, prosecutor's office, police and the City Hall's department for guardianship and trusteeship. Inga has been trying to defend through court her and her two preschool-age children's right to decent living. The relations between her and her former husband were extremely tense (to such an extent that at times police had to interfere in family relations). It all ended in a divorce and the court ordered the former husband to pay alimony for the upkeep of children who reside with Inga. In 2007, the Vanadzor first instance court rejected Inga's suit to give her and the two children some living space from the 4-roomed apartment owned by the children's father, wherefrom Inga's former husband drove her and the children out. The court maintained that Inga was not registered in that apartment. On June 16, 2010, the Vanadzor court granted Inga and her two children a residence right in the apartment in question (where Inga managed to get registration through the passports department in 2009) but until the children attain majority. Inga's former husband lodged a complaint with the RoA Court of Appeals, which (Judge k. Hakobian) examined the statement of claim on September 14, 2010 and banished her from the apartment, while upholding the children's right to reside there. A. Martirossian thus comments on the court ruling, "The ruling does not state who owns the apartment and who Inga is. It would seem that Inga is just a casual person in that home, that she resided there illegally and that is the reason why she was banished from it." She adds, "It turns out that the children's mother should take care of them from behind the door. The court contends that there is an international convention protecting the ownership right. But there is also a convention that protects children's rights, is there not?" We requested attorney Anahit Aloyan to comment on the ruling of the RoA Court of Appeals. In her view, the fact that the court defends the owner's rights is positive. On the other hand, the violation of children's rights because of the law that defends the ownership right is condemnable. According to her, the most adequate course of action in regulating the issue in question was that of the Vanadzor court, which granted the children and their mother the residence right till the children attain majority. The attorney expressed regret that because of the imperfections of the ownership right law the RoA Law on the Rights of the Child is of a declarative nature. Says A. Aloyan, "Is the child to blame that the parents do not reach an understanding. The child should grow in normal conditions." From time to time Alvard Martirossian has to give shelter to Inga and her children in her small apartment (where she takes care of her 80-year-old mother who has diabetes). She expresses her discontent with the children's father who has not paid alimony for five months. They turned to the prosecutor's office of Lori region for help. The office replied that the man "does not evade" and that he promised in writing to pay alimony "when he has money to do so." By the way, after the 16 June 2010 ruling of the Vanadzor court of general jurisdiction granted the residence right to Inga and her children, the owner of the apartment, Inga's former husband, who did not reside there and who left to Russia for a long period of time, demanded that gas be no longer supplied to the apartment. The gas supply was resumed only after Women's Rights Center NGO in Vanadzor and the prosecutor's office of Lori region interfered. Gayane Hovsepyan www.armhels.com, “Ditord” 13-14-2010