Invisible People

Onnik Krikorian / UNICEF Armenia

YEREVAN, Armenia -- A hundred meters from the municipal landfill that sends plumes of smoke produced by smoldering rubbish into the cold morning air, seven-year old Armine Hakobyan should be preparing for her first year at school. However, lacking a birth certificate and other necessary papers, her day will be like any other. Instead of receiving an education she will wash discarded bottles collected from the local rubbish tip to sell for 10 drams each. On a good day, the family can earn 1,500 drams (about $3).

Armine's problem is not common among children in Armenia but it is fast becoming a concern. When she was born seven years ago in the town of Aparan, forty minutes away from the Armenian capital, a doctor demanded 15,000 drams ($30) before he would release the newborn child and her mother from hospital. As her father only had 5,000 drams (about $10) the doctor took not only the money but also the baby's birth certificate. To this day, she remains without it until the "outstanding debt" is "settled."

But while Armine's case is the exception rather than the rule, corruption in the system of registering births has seen an increase in the number of children deprived of the necessary documents that will enable them to seek access to medical care at polyclinics or to receive an education at school. Children without birth certificates or official registration are also unable to receive state benefits and Armine, for example, hasn't even been vaccinated.

According to Naira Avetisyan, UNICEF's Child Protection Officer, it was only possible to identify the phenomenon after local and international organizations working with street children discovered more and more children in similar situations. "While this is a global problem and identified as a violation of the rights of the child throughout this region," she says, "it has been only recently that we can see that the problem is actually increasing in Armenia, especially among socially vulnerable families."

Indeed, Armine's situation is unfortunately not unique although, perhaps, a little different from that in which many of the one hundred children living in a deserted former school in the derelict factory district of Yerevan find themselves in. Here, among an industrial wasteland created when the former Soviet Union imploded, the problem is not that the children's documents have been confiscated but rather that the children do not officially exist at all.

Yet, although it is perhaps too early to wonder how four year old Hovik and his elder brother, Levon, will receive an education when they reach the age of seven, it is already a problem for Alina, his eight year old sister. Literally dressed in rags and shoes befitting paupers plucked straight from a Dickensian novel, none of these children have birth certificates and remain unrecorded in any official statistics. And, because they do not officially exist, their mother can not receive poverty-related benefits. Instead, the children strip the plastic off old aluminum wire to provide the family with an income.

Not surprisingly, so serious are concerns that many children have "fallen through the cracks" that last year, during a session of the Child Rights Commission in Geneva, UNHCR issued a statement expressing concern at the situation in Armenia. According to Avetisyan, the UN agency responsible for refugees recently discovered that in the Vardenis district of Armenia's north-eastern Gegharkunik region alone, 500 children lacked birth certificates.

Later, when UNICEF and UNHCR met with the town's local authorities, they identified the person responsible for the situation. "It was clear that there was corruption in the system and we managed to get this woman removed from her position," says Avetisyan. "In fact, she didn't even deny accusations that she demanded money before issuing children with birth certificates."

Instead, because a new child benefits system in Armenia entitles families of newborn babies to a one-off payment of 40,000 drams upon registering the birth of their children, the official actually believed that demanding 10,000 drams wasn't "unreasonable." Of course, Avetisyan adds, despite the consequences of her actions, the woman was not prosecuted. Part of the problem is that local authorities remain unaware of the importance of birth registration.

Because of these concerns, therefore, UNICEF has already launched a communications and public awareness campaign to target both the families of newborn children as well as the local authorities.

Avetisyan also believes that the problem should be addressed by the Armenian Government's recently announced anti-corruption strategy as well as its Poverty Reduction Strategy Paper (PRSP). "In fact, I think the issue can be linked to a number of existing strategies in Armenia," she says. "This also includes the National Plan of Action on Children because birth registration is perhaps the first right of any child -- to have citizenship and a nationality."

As a result, on 8 October 2004, at a round table attended by representatives from the Ministry of Justice, Labor and Social Issues, Health, Territorial Administration, National Statistics Service and others, UNICEF and UNHCR announced that they plan to launch a program to strengthen the system of birth registration in the Republic of Armenia.

"After a country-wide survey is conducted during 2005 that will identify the full extent of the problem, we will develop a comprehensive national plan of action," says Avetisyan. "There is definitely a problem with birth registration in Armenia and this year, we have responded with what we consider to be emergency actions. For UNICEF's next country cycle, however, we will respond at the level of policy."

Published by UNICEF, 2004.