However, this year alone I knew that there were three cases of missing children. One of them was never found, one’s body was found in a water canal, and the third, after a long search, was found and returned to the family.

It was probably news of these incidents that compelled the women to stop what they were doing and try to deal with a situation where a child wasn’t complying with his grandfather.

The police questioned the man trying to get to the bottom of the matter. Not satisfied with his responses, they finally decided to take him to the police station. I asked to join them, but was not permitted. I asked one of the policemen to provide me a number that I could call later to find out how this story would finally end.

When I called later, I was told that the child’s parents had also come to the police station. They were at work during the incident. Everything was resolved. They have all gone home I was told.

The next day I tried to get information about the child and grandfather from the police. Naturally, they avoided my questions and assured me that everything was fine and the case in question had been closed. The case was closed. However, at least for me, a random passerby, a long list of questions remain unanswered.

Closed Cases and their Irreversible Consequences

It is difficult to say how many similar cases take place every year and how many are so “skillfully” resolved. However, cases that are so quickly “closed” cannot be without consequence.

Experts assure us, violence is not a one-time incident and takes place repeatedly.

Recently in Armenia there have been many discussions about the preservation of the traditional Armenian family and traditional values. These discussions usually ignore the issue of violence. It is considered a “fake agenda” imported from abroad, the aim of which is to disrupt the “peace” of the Armenian family.

Meanwhile, it’s a whole other picture when we look at the numbers in Armenian police reports and research done by NGOs. These numbers are only the tip of the iceberg. It turns out that our children are victims to not only physical and emotional abuse, but sexual abuse as well. Abuse takes place in the home, in schools and in public places.

During the first four months of 2017, 59 incidents of child abuse were registered in Armenia; 24 of them were sexual abuse. During the first four months of 2016, 71 incidents of underage child abuse were registered, 34 of them sexual abuse. Cases of reported abuse within the home were also registered by police: During the first five months of 2018, police recorded three incidents of underage child abuse within their home. In 2017 and 2016, four underage children were victims of abuse inside the home.

During the first eight months of 2014, 138 incidents were recorded of underage child abuse. Seven of them took place inside the home.

According to a survey conducted in 2015-2016 on Armenia’s demography and health, one out eight children between one to 14 years of age, were victims of some sort of emotional or physical punishment within the previous 30 days of the conducted survey.

Ominous Numbers

On September 28, 2018, 32-year-old Rustam Manukyan beat his wife and one-year-old son, Arman Grigoryan. The child did not survive his injuries and died on the way to hospital.

In December, 2016, news broke that in August of that year an eight-year-old girl had been severely beaten by her father for not going to the store to buy him beer. The father apparently regularly beat his wife and three underage children. For causing deliberate bodily injuries to the girl, the court decided to place travel restrictions on the father as probation and to pay a fine of 30,000 AMD (about $60 US).

On December 19, 2016, a hanging woman’s body was found in her home in the city of Spitak. In the bedroom of her apartment they also found her two daughters, dead. The girls were five and seven-years old. According to preliminary reports, the woman strangled her two daughters and then killed herself. The 45-year-old woman was once a patient at the psychiatric ward in the State Clinic of Spitak in 2013. After divorcing her husband, the children were left under her care.

On February 9, 2015, according to official accounts, a 47-year-old woman in Yerevan decided to burn down her house as revenge against her husband who worked abroad. Days later she died in hospital. Her nine-year-old son was saved, despite receiving severe burns. Later it became known that she had struck her son’s head with a hammer and then set the apartment on fire by dousing it with gasoline.

These numbers may seem like plain statistics. But behind these numbers are lives not lived. Lives that may have continued if there were responsible bodies who worked professionally and on time.

In all these cases, investigative journalists have discovered that neighbors, relatives and even the police were aware of the abuse taking place within the home. However, allowing the abuser to get away and failing to stop an inevitable crime, is difficult to comprehend.

A Five-Year-Old Child: Victim of Sexual Abuse

The Armenian Relief Fund, also known as HOF, is a child support center. Manane Petrosyan is the assistant director of the center and says that cases of emotional abuse are the most common they see. However, these cases are not always perceived as abuse and are not always reported. Lately, however, they’ve seen a rise in sexual abuse cases.

“Sexual abuse cases are mostly cases of incest,” she says adding that it’s very difficult to prove. “Of course, experts understand the situation, however their opinions are rarely taken into consideration in courts. We’ve had a case of a five-year-old child who was victim of sexual abuse. Usually it’s six to 15-year-olds who are abused sexually. However, cases of physical and emotional abuse takes place in all age groups.”

HOF works with 800 -100 children yearly. Near 200 children take shelter at the center, 80 percent of whom are children that have been abused.

“At our center a multidisciplinary group of experts work with children of abuse - psychiatrists, social workers, doctors, educators, etc. The team works with the child and the family,” Petrosyan explains. “Our primary goal is to ease the child’s trauma and return him/her to the family. However, that’s not always possible. For example, the father or grandfather sexually abused the child, which happens very often, or the mother’s boyfriend abused the child and the mother will not leave the boyfriend. Naturally, it’s dangerous to return children to these families.” Petrosyan says that they try to find other alternatives, which as a rule is appointing a guardian that is a close family member to provide the child with a familiar environment. “The second alternative is foster care. We send the child to another family. This is not adoption, legally the government continues to be the guardian of the child,” Petrosyan says. “In this case, the government pays the family and the child stays within a family model. The last alternative is sending them to an orphanage. This, of course, does not stem from the child’s best wishes and is the least desirable alternative for us.”