Armenian Chamber of Advocates Elects Chair, Awards Outstanding Advocates

October 2009

Earlier this month, the Armenian Chamber of Advocates re-elected Ruben Sahakyan as its chairperson during its 2009 general meeting. Nearly half of the chamber’s 800 members attended the meeting, with many of those who could not attend represented through proxy voting.

Sahakyan, the chamber’s chairperson for the past four years, was the only nominee for the position. He won 326 of the 351 votes.

Prior to the election process, the general meeting recognized Elena Shaposhnikova, Robert Grigoryan and Masis Ghazanchyan as outstanding advocates, awarding them “advocacy knight” medals. The three advocates were awarded for their exemplary professional work.

Sahakyan presented a report on the chamber’s activities in the past four years, highlighting the importance of the support the chamber gets from the U.S. Agency for International Development and the ABA Rule of Law Initiative (ABA ROLI).

ABA ROLI Country Director in Armenia Kregg Halstead said that the chamber has made a lot of progress towards becoming a sustainable, self-governing organization. ABA ROLI has been working with the chamber since 2000.

To learn more about our work in Armenia, contact the ABA Rule of Law Initiative at <rol@staff.abanet.org>.