Dozens of positions of assistant judges and clerks in Armenia’s courts remain vacant for months on end, mainly because of uncompetitive salary levels.

This creates backlogs of cases for already overworked  staffers.

Arshak Vardapetyan, the First Deputy Head of the Judicial Department, told Hetq that his department analyzed the situation and found out that an elevated level of turnover of judges’ staffs adds to the problem.

There are twenty-eight vacant positions of assistant judges or clerks (as of June 16, 2026), but this number may change daily. Staff turnover in the judges’ chambers occurs almost daily.

Hetq contacted the department’s public relations branch for clarification from judges whose staffs have vacancies, seeking to understand how they work with reduced support. However, the judges declined to speak with us, citing several reasons, including vacation and heavy workloads.

While it may appear that twenty-eight vacancies are few, if we consider the number of hundreds of cases being examined in the proceedings of judges, the impact is great.

Rustam Makhmudyan, President of the Administrative Court of Appeal, March 2026 interview with Hetq noted that the lights in the offices of court judges are turned off at midnight. By law, the workday ends at 6:00 PM, but judges stay on the job to write a judicial act.

“Salaries are simply indescribably low. You cannot expect too much quality or  due diligence and compassion from a judicial employee who receives 115,000-120,000 drams to stay until 10-11 pm and work. It is the sum of all these motivating and unmotivating circumstances that we have what we have,” said Makhmudyan.

According to the Judicial Department, the basic monthly salary of a judge’s assistant is 322,816 drams; 236,312 drams after taxes are withheld. The salary of a judge’s clerk is 139,776 drams, after taxes and mandatory payments - 99,032 drams. Judges’ assistants and clerks also receive a special payment of about 10% of their basic salary.

Given such uncompetitive wages, court staffers regularly seek jobs in the private sector.