YEREVAN. – Some thirty police officers, civil society members and international community representatives on Tuesday met in Armenia’s capital city Yerevan.

They discussed the ways to reform Armenia’s public order management, in particular in the area of street patrolling and policing of public events.

A police expert invited by the OSCE Office in Yerevan, and who has been monitoring public order management by the Armenian police for several years, shared his views with the participants. Based on video footage taken at large-scale public events, the participants tried to come up with solutions on how police officers can maintain order in such situations. Complementing these exercises, the president of Armenia’s Helsinki Human Rights Committee, Avetik Ishkhanyan, presented the findings of a monitoring of the protection of freedom of assembly during public gatherings commissioned by the OSCE Office.

The Office plans to follow up on this event with a training seminar on Thursday and Friday that will give new recruits of the patrol service’s special battalion grounding in the appropriate use of force at public events and train them on communication and negotiation skills.