Estimates place the number of former orphanage residents without adequate housing at around 300.
“This country will not issue me a passport since I have no birth certificate. But ever since I opened my eyes, I have seen only Armenia. I have served in this country’s military. All I want is a piece of paper so I can keep my job,” Igor says.
MP Bakhshyan argued that the children were being “tossed out” with nowhere to go despite legal guarantees that the state must provide for their social needs, including housing.
Zatik Orphanage Director Ashot Mnatsakanyan says that they are allowed to keep the children until the age of 18.
In February 2007 “Hetq” published the following articles: “Apartments for Graduates from Children’s Homes are Unfit to Live In” and “Beneficiaries are to Blame, Says Ministry”. It has taken the General Prosecutor’s Office of the Republic of Armenia about a year to take an interest in the issues raised in those articles.
A number of NGOs and psychologists who deal with issues related to graduates from children's homes stress that many initiatives aimed at helping children raised in such homes often fail to produce the desired results only because after receiving a certain amount of material assistance, these children are not prepared to live and build their future on their own.
Children's home graduate Artur Barseghyan was scheduled to received a one-room apartment under the State Aid to Children's Home Graduates program in 2004.
The February 12 issue of Hetq included the article Apartments for Graduates from Children's Homes Are Unfit to Live In, after which a meeting was organized at the initiative of the Ministry of Labor and Social Affairs, where they attempted to explain to Hetq why some apartments end up in dilapidated condition within just a few months and who is to blame for this situation.
Since 2003 the Government of Armenia has been providing the graduates of children's homes with apartments, but many of these young people have been given apartments that are unfit to live in.